Sociology of Indian Society: Study Material

SOCIOLOGY OF INDIAN SOCIETY
(SOC1C03)
STUDY MATERIAL
I SEMESTER
CORE COURSE
M.A. SOCIOLOGY
UNIVERSITY OF CALICUT
SCHOOL OF DISTANCE EDUCATION
CALICUT UNIVERSITY P.O.
MALAPPURAM - 673 635, KERALA
190353
School of Distance Education
University of Calicut
Study Material
First Semester
M.A. SOCIOLOGY
Core Course:
SOC1C03 : SOCIOLOGY OF INDIAN SOCIETY
Prepared by:
Smt. RANJINI P.T.
Assistant Professor
School of Distance Education
University of Calicut.
Scrutinized by:
Dr. V. SHINJU
Assistant Professor & HOD
Vimala College
Thrissur.
MODULE 1
INDIAN SOCIETY: HISTORICAL EMERGENCE
1.1 Historical context and emergence of Modern India-
British rule and its impact (A R Desai, Ramachandra
Guha)
1.2 Freedom movement and the emergence of the India
nation (A R Desai)
1.3 Indian Society in the post- Independence era
MODULE 2
APPROACHES TO THE STUDY OF INDIAN SOCIETY-I
2.1 Development of sociology in India- contextualization
and Indigenization
2.2 Indological approach: Louis Dumont-
Homohierarchicus, purity and pollution, Ghurye- origin
and features of caste system
2.3 Structural-functional Approach: Srinivas-social
structure and Mobility, Dube- Village society
MODULE 3
APPROACHES TO THE STUDY OF INDIAN SOCIETY-II
3.1 Cultural approach: Surajith Sinha-Tribe and caste
civilization, N K Bose- civilizational view of Indian
society
3.2 Dialectical approach: D P Mukherjee- India social
structure, A R Desai- Social unrest and nationalism
3.3 Subaltern perspective: David Hardiman- Devi
movement, Ambedkar-Annihilation of caste
MODULE 4
CURRENT ISSUES IN INDIAN SOCIETY
4.1 Contemporary Issues in India: Poverty, Inequality of
caste and class, Issues in agrarian sector
4.2 Secularism, communalism, ethnicity
4.3 Nationalism: Views of Tagore, M K Gandhi, Nehru,
Constitutional views
SOC1C03 : Sociology of Indian Society
MODULE 1
INDIAN SOCIETY: HISTORICAL EMERGENCE
This paper will introduce to learners the historical
emergence of sociology in India and how the various
approaches help to develop sociology in its mature form.
Sociology emerged in West and therefore the sociological
approaches of the West expanded to other parts of the globe.
However, many Indian scholars began to realize that there are
various social aspects that are peculiar to Indian society which
need to be studies through Indian perspective as against the
western approaches that had been universally applied to. This
leads to the emergence of Indian sociology. This paper
constituted by four modules, first module discusses the
emergence of modern India or Indian society. Society is the
subject of analysis of sociology so this module familiarizes
Indian society and its development in present form. Second
module discusses various approaches which help to the
development of sociology for India. It mainly highlights the
realization of emergence of sociology fully based on the Indian
resources and thinkers criticize the application of Western
theories in Indian context. The module gives an idea about the
vast Indian resources which influence the development of
sociology of India. Third module analyses the approaches
helps to the study of Indian society. It deeply analyses the
Indian society and the Indian resources which helps to develop
an intellectual tradition for India. Fourth module mainly
concentrates on the current issues in Indian society. This paper
provides a clear picture about Indian society, Indian social
School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 1

resources and the social problems in India.

Historical context and emergence of Modern India- British
rule and its impact
The influence of various foreign powers can be seen in
the formation and cultural integration of India. India has been
invaded and ruled by many foreign powers. Therefore, the
evolution of Indian society is a complex process. An
amalgamation of different cultures can be seen in the culture of
India. To understand the cultural, political and economic
tradition of modern society, it is necessary to know about the
ancient society. The direct and indirect effects of British rule
caused the formation of a national consciousness among
Indians and it led to the formation of a new nation.
To understand the historical background and rise of
modern India, it is necessary to understand the influence of
foreign powers, especially the British rule. This section is
mainly divided into two, the first on the social, economic and
cultural spheres of pre-British India and the second, on British
rule and its impact.
Nature of village in pre-British India
The village is considered as the chief unit of the rural
society. The emergence of villages is closely related with the
agricultural economy in history. Beginning of agriculture
caused the end of nomadic mode of collective life and started
to permanent settlement. Subsequently it caused the emergence
of organized life in a particular territory and agriculture is
fixed as their occupation. The structure of agricultural

production in Indian villages has continued uninterrupted for

centuries. The village community has not challenged the ritual
rights of the villagers by any rulers. The rural people have for
centuries led an economic life based on self-sufficient rural
agriculture. Each village is a closed system with very little
social, economic and intellectual exchange with the outside
world. Within the village, the economic life based on the
primitive agricultural and handicraft industry was at a low and
almost stagnant level.
Rural agriculture produces for the needs of the village.
All the products were used locally by the rural people, both
farmers and non-farmers. If you trace out the history of
agriculture, we could find out three major types of agricultural
production techniques, such as Hoe culture, plough culture and
the higher technical cultural phase of tractors and fertilizers.
Most of the part agriculture is mainly based on plough and
limited division of labour. The entire agricultural works carried
by the peasant family on the basis of simple division of labour.
The technique of production caused division of labour among
the members. It provides a particular function in production to
some group of people. In addition to farming families, the rural
population included industrial workers - smiths, carpenters,
potters, weavers, a copper miner, a washer man, an oilman, a
barber, and so on. They all worked almost to meet the needs of
the rural people.
Rural handicrafts men locally secured the raw materials
for their handicrafts such as wood, clay and covering.
Firewood was available from the forest on the outskirts of the

village. Cotton is grown in almost all parts of the country. The

village was self-sufficient in raw materials required for the
rural handicraft industry. Local products prepared mainly by
local workers and resources are used locally. There was very
little exchange between the village and the outside world.
Small trade took place on a particular day of the week.
Family is one of the significant institutions in rural
society and plays a vital role in the material or cultural life of
the people. Primarily which was a collection of families
organized for community and the second was the integration of
families united by law in relation to marriage, diet, occupation,
and interaction with others in the community. Professor Rivers
identified four types of institutions that are related to the term
family, such as the clan, Matrilocal joint family, the Patrilocal
joint family and the individual family. The rural family
includes not only family members but also distant relatives in
the urban community. The members of the rural family form a
single economic unit and co-operate with each other in
agricultural activities. The interrelationships of the various
families were governed by the rural community and the caste.
Caste system is one of the social groupings found in India.
Castes have a dominant role in the determining function, status
and available opportunity of an individual. The caste and
ethnic social organization of the rural people was not
conducive to individual venture, adventure and stepping out of
new paths. The villagers considered the caste system to be
divinely judged, submitted to all its prohibitions and
restrictions and passively accepted the 'God-created', caste

system given to them in the social and economic structure of

rural life.
The village is generally divided into regions, each
inhabited by members of a particular caste. Furthermore, when
certain members of a caste cease to pursue occupations
determined by caste, they generally remain in the same area
and socialize with other members of their caste. The attitude of
the rural man towards education is also importantly determined
by the caste, and even by the nature of the education he wishes
to receive.
Education in pre-British India was caste-segregated in
Hindu society, with the Brahmin caste having the sole right to
preach religious teachings, to be ordained as priests and to be
entitled to a caste system in which each caste was assigned a
specific social function. Brahmins mainly worked as a teacher
and priest. Therefore, they alone had the privilege of studying
all higher religious and secular knowledge. Other castes were
barred from all higher studies by religious orders issued by the
Hindu government. The Brahmins who studied in special
seminaries started school. The medium of instruction was the
sacred Sanskrit of the Hindus, in which only all religious and
higher secular knowledge was expressed.
For the common people, there were local schools in
every village and town, mainly teaching the reading, writing
and basics of mathematics. These schools also provided
religious instruction to the students. These schools generally
benefited the children of the merchants. Women, lower castes
and farmers were not educated. In British East Indian society,

except in the early periods of the Vedic period, women were

given subordination to men. It is true that in the history of
India there have been cases of great women like Gargi,
Chandrabi, Noor Jahan, Rasya Begum, Queen Ansani, Mirabai
and Ahilyabai who have made great achievements in the fields
of literature, art, philosophy, governance and war. But these
women were descended from the ruling ancestral section of
society. Equality and equal rights for men and women were not
recognized by law and religion. Society allowed men to
achieve rights and freedoms that excluded women. Different
criteria were adopted to assess the personal and social behavior
of men and women. Therefore, Indian women, who lived
enmasse, were therefore free from the conditions of social
subordination which had no freedom or opportunity to express
them. Thus education among the Hindus in British Pre-India
was extremely limited and the educational opportunity was
very poor for all except the Brahmins. The Brahmin enjoyed
the monopoly of all higher education.
Higher education was not monopolized by a section of
Muslims in British Pre-India. This was due to the democratic
nature of Islam. Any Muslim can study in a Madrasa.
However, since the Qur'an was written in that language, all
higher education was imparted in Arabic, a foreign language in
India. However, in addition to the Qur'an, there were schools
that taught local languages, Persian, 'the language of Islamic
culture and governance', and other subjects.
Awareness of a common political existence does not
exist as the state has not exercised fundamental influence even

in the social, ideological, economic and administrative life of

the rural community. Rulers in a particular region do not
penetrate the social and economic structure of rural life. Not
only has the village's self-sufficient economy not been affected
by such political changes, but the social and legal processes of
rural life have continued as before, with the ancient caste and
village (Panchayath) committees and codes governing them.
Village administration is carried out by the Gram
Panchayath, which consists of elected or representatives of the
various castes, generally the elders of the castes, or the head of
the village. The Gram Panchayath was the link between the
villagers and the higher authorities. The Panchayath and the
headman worked to maintain peace in the village. He was also
involved in resolving disputes among the villagers, deciding
the tax to be levied on the farming family and collecting it for
the State.
As mentioned above, the administrative, judicial,
policing and economic activities of the village were carried out
by the Gram Panchayath and Headman. It regulates the
personal, social and religious life of the villagers by various
caste councils and regulates behaviour of the castes.
The rural religions have a significant role in the
formation of social and cultural life of rural people. They have
greater predisposition towards religion than urban people.
“Their family life, caste life, general social life, economic and
even recreational life are more or less governed by a religious
approach and religious norms”. Rituals are associated with
most of the life activities of the rural people. Different rituals

have emerged for various religious and non-religious activities

and have been followed by the rural people as part of their
lives. Temples were not just a place of worship. The temple
has also served as an important center for rural activities.
Hindu and Muslim cultures, religiously, flourished in
the cities under the protection of kings, nobles and wealthy
merchants. Large Hindu temples in many Hindu places of
worship were built by Hindu kings, nobles or wealthy
merchants. The Muslim kings had no special patronage of art
and culture. The large Mosques in main cities like Delhi, Agra,
Lahore, Ahmadabad and in many other cities built by Muslim
kings. In those days, cities were also centers of learning. Hindu
and later Muslim seminaries operated in various cities. Thus
the pre-British city had a rich and complex cultural life.
The villager does not feel the urge to freely explore that
structure and the ideology that sustains it. In fact, his constant
social frustration with the forces of nature, such as floods and
droughts, and the religious philosophy that gripped the caste
system and the authoritarian joint family, strengthened his
isolated social existence in the village.
At the same time, only a small section of population
lived in urban areas. The urban economy was more developed
and diverse as it had to meet the very complex and many needs
of social strata such as the king and his nobles, wealthy
merchants, and high court dignitaries. Cities of political
importance were the capitals of nations and empires and the
seats of government headquarters of nobles or emperors, courts
of nobles, military chiefs, and state officials of various grades.

They were the main cantonments as most of the army was

stationed in the capitals. A good portion of the land acquired
by the State from the village was spent on the towns. The
business community used its profits in the cities.
Urban industries that meet the various needs of
different groups can be broadly divided into three categories.
There was the first group of industries of a luxury or semi-
luxury type, which produced luxury articles for the aristocracy
and the rich in the community, both Indian and foreign. These
industries are an important part of the overall urban industry.
There was a group of industries that met the needs of the State
and other public institutions. Urban industrial workers are
broadly divided into two groups, those who work
independently, those who are hired by the State and other
corporations or private individuals on a wage basis.
There was a great and constant movement out of these
cities for military, political, trade or cultural reasons. People
came to the city not only from other Indian cities but also from
other countries where India developed and expanded with
travelers, merchants, philosophers, artists or propagandists of
other faiths. It caused economic and cultural exchange between
cities but also other countries.
Due to the almost invisible balanced economic status of
the self-sufficient village, the industrial and trade sectors of the
towns could not bring the rural sector into the orbit of any
significant trade activity. This not only controlled the growth
of industry and trade in British pre-India, but also made the
classes financially and therefore politically dependent and

served the feudal prince and his nobles. They could not
conquer the countryside economically, mobilize the support of
the rural masses against Indian feudalism and seize power.
There were cities of commercial importance because they were
located on the shores of seas or on the banks of navigable
rivers or at the confluence of strategic commercial routes.
Intricate and diverse handicraft industries flourished in these
towns.
Capitalist economic forms have brought modern
nations into existence in different societies, creating the Indian
nation by uniting a loose society economically and socially.
Capitalist society, like its predecessor, has a class structure.
The bourgeois nation also included classes, and in India, the
aristocracy was mixed with the reactionary feudal mixture of
the semi-feudal. The new social classes, that is, the progressive
sections of the bourgeoisie and the petty bourgeoisie, the
peasants and the working class, were the byproduct of the new
national economy, an integral part of the new national society.
The nation, at various stages of its unification,
expresses the consciousness of a single economy and the
impetus for the existence of an independent nation. It further
develops a culture that expresses the needs of the development
of national society and the aspirations of individuals, groups
and classes for a free, unhindered and prosperous society
through song, sculpture, painting, drama, novel or sociological
literature, Economic and cultural life. The consciousness of the
towns-people, the king, the nobles, the merchants, and the
merchants was not a national consciousness. National culture

did not exist in British pre-India.

British rule and its impact
The political situation and economic prosperity in India
helped the foreign powers to seize power. There have been
many unfamiliar incursions, military attacks, violent uprisings
and wars in India. As a result, India was ruled by various
foreign powers. It has influenced a social, political, rigid and
philosophical structure of Indian culture, yet not made a
profound impact on the economic base.
The British pre-Indian economy was an Asiatic feudal
economy with some distinct features from the European feudal
economy. One feature of this economic system was the lack of
private property on land. Britain could not use colonial India
for its own capitalist economic purposes without uprooting the
feudal base of Indian society and the introduction of capitalist
economic forms in India. In other words, the conquest of India
by the British was of different kinds. The British conquered the
Indian economy by destroying the self- sufficiency of the
villages and laying the foundation for modern bourgeois
society.
The new states that arose among the remainders of the
Mughal Empire were economically controlled by the
merchants, despite the fact that their political structure stayed
feudal nature. Before the developing industry class in India, it
seized political power from the feudal classes to build
economic and social power and used that power for capitalist
development. British feudal economy of pre-India is being

transformed into a progressive capitalist economy. Therefore,

it is related to the decay of the old classes related to the old
industries and the land system and the rise of the new classes
which depend on the new land relations and the new modern
industries.
Impact on Agriculture and land relations
British conquest of India led to a revolution within the
existing land system. The new financial gain system
introduced by the British in India created two varieties of
property on land, the first is that, standard rights of the
agricultural community over rural land and second is, Land
possession and individual farmer ownership.
In 1793, Lord Cornwallis created the primary
landowners in India by establishing permanent land
settlements in Bengal province and Orissa. These landlords
were created from the tax farmers of the selected provinces.
The British authorities commissioned revenue collectors to
collect revenue from these provinces. The permanent land
settlement turned these revenue collectors into several
landowners. But the revenue collectors/landowners were not
able to make quick payments to the government under this
land system.
There are three main reasons that led British rulers to
ascertain a landholder system in India. First, the East India
Company in India adopted British legal-economic ideas on
land. Within the last feudal period, the landlord system was
formed by the attitude of the heritage of personal property on

the land. Second, from an administrative point of view, in the

early stages of British rule, it was found that acquiring land
revenue from thousands of landowners was easy and highly
economical. Third, for political-strategic reasons, the British
dominion in India wants social support in the country to
sustain itself. It had been hoped that the new form of
landowners who owed British government its survival would
naturally support it.
The village was slowly and steadily transformed from
an autonomous society into a unit of the centralized State and
an economic half keen about the national economy, even of the
global economy. The economic and autocracy of the standard
village has disappeared.
While experts prove that critical economic gains from
landowners have adversely affected the government
financially, new land settlements based on revenue are being
introduced on an experimental basis. As a part of it British
government introduced two methods for collection of land
revenue, i.e. Zamindari and Ryotwari.
Zamindari settlements were implemented in a large part
of the United Provinces and Punjab. British administration
caused large scale land ownership in some parts of the country,
whereas in others it created individual peasant ownership. The
second was referred to as Ryotwari, in this system; the
individual farmer became the owner of the land he farmed.
Private holding toward land came into existence in
India. Land becomes personal property, an artifact within the

market, which may be mortgaged, bought or sold. It set the

precedents for the agrarian capitalism by introducing
individual ownership of land, i.e., peasant ownership and
large-scale land ownership. The new land system eliminated
the village as a unit of land. The income previously received
by the king or its intermediary is a fixed part of the actual
production of the year. It has now been replaced by a fixed
payment system, which has to assess the land and forced
farmers to pay it regularly. This system didn’t consider the
production or harvest of the year. It forced farmers to sell their
land to others.
With the establishment of private property in land and
new social and economic settings affected the family system in
the rural area. The centralized tendencies emerged inside the
joint family, with members antecedently holding put together
assigned land assigned by the village. This led to the division
of family land between different claimants that augmented the
subdivision of land.
The new land relations in the agricultural sector led to
the emergence of some problems in agricultural sector such as
Technical and economic issues, the formation of compact
economic holdings, the introduction of recent agricultural
machinery, the reorganization of agricultural technology,
scientific fertilizers and alternative scientific farming strategies
became national issues. The consequences of subdivision and
land fragmentation are terribly damaging to the agricultural
sector and also the economic standing of the agronomist. Due
to the lack of money for investment in the agriculture sector,

the farmer was forced to follow old methods for means of

production. They couldn't use scientific manure and trendy
agricultural machinery and will not keep the cattle healthy and
strong. This led to the progressive collapse of the agricultural
sector.
Land tax/rent is one of the main causes of debt.
Farmers' incomes have dropped by more than half, and the tax
burden on farmers remains the same. The inability to pay rent
on the part of the tenants led to a large accumulation of their
territory by the money lenders. Due to the increasing debt of
the peasants, the transfer of land from the hands of the
peasants to the moneylenders took place in the Ryotwari areas
and the tenants were evicted enmasse from the land they held
in the Zamindari zones. The moneylender took advantage of
the farmer's financial helplessness.
The class of landlords, moneylenders, merchants, or
rich men in urban occupations, as within the old class
Zamindars, typically didn't play a helpful progressive role in
agricultural development. Each of these old and new landlords
showed no real interest in the agricultural sector, but was
interested in collecting rent from their tenants.
It also contributed to the expansion of impoverishment
among farmers. Additionally to economic abruption like
agricultural crises that occur from time to time, non-social
causes such as drought or devastating rains additionally caused
economic distress to farmers. Real fact is that Indian farmers
didn’t have an economical reserve. An oversized range of
Indian farmers are in debt as they're unable to pay land income

as a result of bad monsoon. The land use system established by

the British was one amongst the foremost factors contributory
to the poverty and financial obligation of the agricultural
population. We could see the emergence of serfs in some areas
of the country. It was the consequences of higher debt of the
farmer. Serf guaranteed to do all the services needed by them
in exchange for the loan received and also the interest on the
loan.
With the increase of industries in England, the demand
for raw materials for these industries augmented. British
government in India introduced land policies, which increased
the realm of growth of raw materials needed by British
industries. Farmers began to produce for the market and the
agro-commercialization resulting from the development of
reasonable advances in British standard means of
transportation and elements of exchange capital forced farmers
to discontinue their own crops and produce new crops.
Thereby it caused the exploitation and specialization of Indian
agriculture. The diversion of rural agricultural production from
meeting the individual wants of farmers and rural to the
upkeep of the Indian and world markets hindered not solely the
exploitation and specialization of crops, but also unity of
traditional agricultural systems.
The arrival of cheap British and non-British machine
tools in India was the foundation reason for the decline of rural
artisans. The introduction of the railways and later buses
expedited the delivery of goods of merchandise to the villages.
Railways and steamships created it attainable for European

power producers to supply Indian farmer’s higher products

than Indian rural artisans. In short, they transformed India into
an agricultural colony, producing raw materials primarily for
British industries. In addition, their main goal was to sell the
goods produced in the British factories to the Indian colonies.
It destroyed the self-sufficient economy of the village and
made the rural economy an integral part of the unified Indian
economy.
The deindustrialization of India is the destruction of the
old handicraft industry without the commensurate growth of
modern industry. As a result, congestion on land is increasing
and fragmentation accelerated the process. However, the most
crucial factor accelerating the process of subdivision of land is
the destruction of millions of urban and rural artisans industry
and excessive economic depression in the agricultural sector.
This extreme disintegration of land made it very difficult for
the farmer to carry out agricultural activities efficiently.
Capital is required to open new agricultural activities and
Indian farmers with all the burden of debt cannot afford the
initial investment required to start new agriculture. The
government is extraordinarily indifferent to the current issue
and doesn't offer the other sort of subsidies or simple monetary
assistance.
British administration caused the emergence of new
institutions in the society. The new land system, the village
now not closely-held the land, therefore there was no
agricultural superintendent. Previously villager’s social,
economic and political matters were principally regulated by

members of the village community. Village committees

(Panchayaths) controlled relations between the villagers. After
the British conquest, the legal codes and legal courts
established by the new government, so all land disputes are
currently settled not by the Gram Panchayaths but by the
Courts established by the Central State. The new land system
not only deprived the village of its agro-economic activities,
but also its judicial activities.
Rise of New Social Classes in India
Primarily, the new classes came into existence as a
result of the basic economic transformation brought about by
various acts of the British government, the penetration of
Indian society by commercial and other forces from the outside
capitalist world, and the establishment of modern industries in
India. These classes were unknown to past Indian society,
since they were primarily the result of the new capitalist
economic structure which developed in India as a result of the
British conquest and the impact on the British and world
economy. The Indian people were reshuffled into new social
groupings, new classes, as a result of the basic capitalist
economic transformation of Indian society.
We will next enumerate the new social classes which
evolved in the Indian society during the British rule. In
agrarian areas these were principally (1) Zamindars created by
the British government; (2) Absentee landlords; (3) Tenants
under Zamindars and absentee landlords; (4) The class of
peasant proprietors divided into upper, middle and lower
strata; (5) Agricultural labourers; (6) The modern class of

merchants and (7) The modern class of money-lenders.

We will now refer to another new social class which
came into being in the Indian society, the modern working
class. It was a class which grew in proportion as plantations,
modern factories, mining industry, and transport developed in
India. The Indian proletariat was formed predominantly out of
the pauperized peasants and ruined artisans, who became wage
earners.
In the urban areas, these were principally (1) The
modern class of capitalists, industrial, commercial and
financial; (2) The modern working class engaged in industrial,
transport, mining, and such other enterprises; (3) The class of
the petty traders and shopkeepers bound up with modern
capitalist economy; (4) The professional classes such as
technicians, doctors, lawyers, professors, journalists,
managers, clerks and others, comprising the intelligentsia and
the educated middle class.
The establishment of railways and accumulation of
profits and savings in the hands of the Indian trading class, a
section of Zamindars and wealthy members of the professional
classes, which could serve as capital, led to the rise of Indian-
owned textile, mining, and other industries caused the growth
of the new class of industrial bourgeoisie in the country. As a
result of the enormous expansion of internal and foreign trade,
the establishment, in course of time, and subsequent growth of
modern industries, during the period of the British rule, a new
class developed, the class of modern commercial, industrial
and financial bourgeoisie. This class was, as in other countries,

economically and socially perhaps the strongest class in India.

The workers operate modern power-driven machinery
and are not dependent on the capricious forces of Nature like
rain for the fruition of the labour they invest in the production
process. This has a tendency to make the worker self-
confident, logical and clear headed, in contrast to the peasant
who develops self-diffidence and defeatism. Moreover, the
labour process in which the worker is engaged is based on a
more complex and extensive division of labour. The daily
necessity of cooperating with other workers in the production
process itself slowly engenders in the worker a collective urge
and a capacity to co-operate.
Development of Transportation and Communication
Until the middle of the nineteenth century, India's
transportation system was exceptionally poor. By the middle of
the nineteenth century, there was a genuine focus on
improving the methods for transportation and communication.
For social and economic growth, far reaching and proficient
methods for transportation are required. In addition to building
roads, it introduced new modes of transport and
communication, especially railways and the telegraph. Indians
requested that the railroads should give more consideration to
the economic requirements of the nation than to unfamiliar
interests. The railroads were making enormous benefits and a
huge bit of these benefits left the nation. Despite the fact that
the railroads were generally claimed by the public authority,
they were kept up by different British organizations. The effect
of Railways on the Indian economy and public life is

numerous and significant. They made the development of

people and products quicker, less expensive and more secure.
Railways helped to deliver food grains to remote areas of the
country. It should be remembered that the transport
advancement that occurred was not expected to advance India's
economic development.
The advent of the transport and communication system
has also adversely affected the agricultural sector. This
modification is delineated because the transition from home-
to- home farming to market-based farming. Because the
growth of transport facilities began to erode the compact
nature of the village, subsequently it caused a profound impact
on the agricultural economy.
The advancement of the railroad made new class in the
transportation sector. These were workers required for the
establishment and maintenance work of railroad lines. The vast
majority of those workers came from agriculture sectors or
landless agrarian labourers.
The condition of women
The British conquest of India transformed the social
setting in India. It released objective and subjective forces
which kindled democratic urges among the people. The social
reform movement, which arose out of the new conditions of
social existence, set itself the task of removing the social and
legal injustices and inequalities from which the Indian women
suffered.
The capitalist economy, which the British conquest

inaugurated in India and the legal and political regime

established in the country, was based on the principles of the
recognition of individual equality and contractual freedom of
the individual. It did not admit, on principle, all inequalities
based on birth, sex distinction, caste or community. Though
they were the enlightened individuals of the male section who
launched initial efforts to abolish laws and customs which
suppressed womanhood, in course of time, the victims of those
injustices bestirred themselves and organized the movement
for their emancipation under their own leadership.
The destruction of the old society and the emergence of
the new, after the British conquest of India, were paralleled by
the growth of a new outlook among the Indian people.
Authoritarian conceptions were increasingly replaced by
libertarian ones which affirmed that all individuals should have
equal rights and freedom irrespective of sex, caste, race or
creed. The hundred and fifty years of the British rule were
years of effort on the part of the progressive section of the
Indian people to realize the democratic principle in politics,
religion, education and the social sphere. It was in the name of
this principle that Swaraj was demanded, abolition of caste
distinctions and inequalities was advocated, monopoly rights
of hereditary priesthood in the sphere of religion were
attacked, as also equal rights of men and women in economic,
political, social and educational fields were proclaimed.
Caste system
Religious and caste hegemony began to change during
the British rule. The increased prevalence of modern means of

communication and the British rule and laws caused the

weakening of the functional base of the caste system. The law
such as, the Caste Disabilities Removal Act of 1850, the
Special Marriage Act of 1872 and Special Marriage
Amendment Act of 1923 contributed to undermine the
domination of caste.
The destruction of rural dictatorship, the creation of
private property on land, the sustainable industrialization of the
country, the creation of new jobs and the creation of modern
cities have led to the abolition of many caste restrictions. In
addition to these, for the first time in the history of India, the
expansion of a network of railways and buses led to mass
contact and a blow to the caste system.
The British government made education secular. It is
accessible to anyone, regardless of race or community. Despite
its flaws and limitations, this education remained generous in
content. It propagated the principles of equality before the law,
equal rights of all citizens of the state, and equal freedom to
pursue any occupation.
The Indian people were divided into capitalists,
workers, peasants, merchants, tenants, landlords, doctors,
lawyers and technicians. Newly emerging organizations such
as Mill owners Association, All India trade Union congress,
the all India Kisan Sabha, workers tried to protect their
interests and develop a new consciousness and vision. This led
to the elimination of the caste consciousness of the members of
that organization.
Political movements such as the Non-Cooperation

Movement of 1921-2 and the Non-Cooperation Movement of

1930-3 played a major role in strengthening national
consciousness among the Indian people. The Brahmosamaj,
formed under the leadership of Raja Ram Mohan Roy, was an
outspoken critic of the caste system and sought to eradicate the
caste problems that existed in the society. In addition, the
social and religious reform movements that emerged during
that period had a significant impact on the caste system.
Introduction of Western education
The influence of the West and Britain normally led to
the rise of modern society in India, subsequently it caused the
rampant modern education among our people. The new
education was basically lay and customarily liberal in
perspective and content. It marks the transition from spiritual
and authoritarian to secular and liberal character education.
The spread of modern education was terribly slow, primarily
confined to the center and higher echelons of urban society.
Three major agencies were accountable for the spread
of modern education in India. They were foreign Christian
missionaries, British government and progressive Indians. The
introduction of modern education in India was primarily
galvanized by the political, administrative and economic
interests of England in India. For sustainable political
governance, British’s need a large number of educated
persons. The serving of educated people from the British itself
couldn't be possible. Therefore, it's necessary to establish
colleges and schools in India to switch the educated folks that
handle the executive tools of British rule.

Important posts in the British Government were held

by the British and posts below them were given to educated
Indians. The British rulers argued that if the whole world was
culturally Englishized it would lead to social and political
change and that the most liberal and effective culture in the
world belonged to the British. British were galvanized by
nearly missionary activities to unfold British education and
culture.
Indians were the third strongest agency for the
promotion of modern education in India. Raja Ram Mohan
Roy was the pioneer of progressive modern education in India.
He praised English education as the key to the treasures of
scientific and democratic thought in the modern West.
Subsequently, several organizations including Brahma Samaj,
Arya Samaj, Ramakrishna Mission, Aligarh Movement,
Deshmukh, Chiplunkar, Agarkar, MaganbhaiKaramchand,
Karve, Tilak, Gokhale, Malaviya and Gandhi worked for the
establishment. Educational institutions that provide modern
education across the country, for both men and women.
Rise of Modern Indian Intelligentsia
The role of the intelligentsia in the history of modern
Indian nationalism was decisive. They integrated, to a great
extent, the Indian people into a modern nation and organized
various progressive social-reform and religious-reform
movements in the country. Raja Ram Mohan Roy and his
group constituted the first group of intelligentsia who studied
western culture and imbibed its rationalist and democratic
doctrines, conceptions, and spirit. The number of educated

Indians was small in the first decades of the nineteenth

century. It was only after the British government established
more and more schools and colleges, private effort of the
missionary groups and enlightened.
With the establishment of Universities in the country
after 1857, the numerical strength of the educated Indians
rapidly increased. The educated Indians were the first to
acquire national consciousness in India. Outstanding members
of the Indian intelligentsia backed up by a commercial and
incipient industrial bourgeoisie founded in 1885 the first
national political organization of the Indian people, the Indian
National Congress. They were the pioneers, organizers and
leaders of political national movements. They brought ideas of
nationalism and freedom to wider sections of the Indian
people, through educational and propaganda work.
The educated Indian tried to inculcate the spirit of
nationalism and democracy through their literature. They
produced great scientists, poets, historians, sociologists,
literateurs, philosophers and economists. In fact the
progressive intelligentsia, which assimilated modern western
democratic culture and comprehended the complex problems
of the incipient Indian nation, were the makers of modern
India.
The subsequent history of the nationalist movement in
India, which developed mainly under the leadership of the
Indian National Congress, a broad middle class basis in the
first decade of the twentieth century. The various social reform
and religious reform movements among the Hindus, the

Muslims and other communities, were organized by the

members of the intelligentsia of those communities. In fact,
almost all progressive social, political, and cultural movements
which took place during the British rule were the work of the
intelligentsia who had imbibed the new western education and
culture.
Emergence of Printing press
The introduction of the printing press in India was an
event of revolutionary significance in the life of the Indian
people. In modern times, the Press has become a powerful
social institution. The printing press played a big role, in the
history of a number of peoples, in their national awakening, in
their imbibing progressive ideas, and in their being drawn as
active forces into great social, political and cultural
movements. It facilitates the exchange of thought on a mass
scale in the shortest time. The Press was a formidable weapon
in the hands of the Europeans in the seventeenth, eighteenth,
and nineteenth centuries; in integrating themselves as nations,
in organizing struggles against feudal disunity maintained by
the feudal nobility, in establishing the modern national state,
society, and culture. It thereby helps to establish popular
democratic control over them. The awakening and growth of
national consciousness among them gave rise to the nationalist
press. This is proved by the fact that the Press has been
glorified as the Fourth Estate. The Press moulds as well as
mirrors all complex processes of modern life.
Indian society underwent the greatest transformation in
history after British rule. Its technological base, economic

structure, social institutional framework based on caste system

and joint family, political organization, ideological direction
and cultural value systems have undergone qualitative
transformation. These changes were not attractive or
acceptable to all, as the British rulers fundamentally created
changes in Indian society to serve their own interests, thus
creating a particular kind of contradictions and animosities in
Indian society. Gradually Indian society began to work against
the exploitation of the British and it led to the independence of
the country.
1.1- Freedom Movement and the emergence of the Indian
Nation
The rise of Indian nationalism was the product of the
action and interaction of the numerous objective and subjective
social forces during the British period. The emotion of
nationalism did not evolve among the Indian people in pre-
British India. During the British rule, India underwent many
changes in the socio-cultural, economic and political spheres.
Many programmes and policies devised by the British to fulfill
their vested interests later paved the way for the creation of a
sense of national consciousness among the Indian people. The
different factors like modern transport, new education, press,
and others, caused contributing towards the unification of the
Indian people.
Growing national consciousness and its causes
As India got unified and joined as a country during the
nineteenth and twentieth century, national sentiment

effortlessly developed among the individuals. The British

gradually presented and officially bound together an alluring
and modern government all through the nation. The demolition
of the rural and local self-sufficient economy and the massive
introduction of modern trade and industry have united the
economic life of India as a whole and linked the economic fate
of the people living in different parts of the country.
The basis of the Indian national movement was that the
growing British rule had become a major cause of India's
economic backwardness. It has become a major obstacle to
India's further economic, social, cultural, intellectual and
political development. Moreover, this fact was increasingly
accepted by Indians. The various sections of Indian society
were zamindars, landlords and princes, whose interests were
aligned with those of foreign rulers, and thus supported foreign
rule until the end. But over time many individuals even from
these classes joined the national movement.
As a result of the spread of modern Western education
and thought in the nineteenth century, many Indians were able
to understand modern rational, secular, democratic and
national political perspectives. By becoming modern in their
thinking, they gained the ability to study the advantages and
disadvantages of foreign rule. Educational system enabled
educated Indians to immerse themselves in Western thought, to
take the lead in the national movement and to provide a
democratic and modern sense of direction. Modern education
has created a unified vision and interest among educated
Indians in a society.

The press was the main tool by which nationalist

Indians spread the message of patriotism, economic, social and
political ideas and created an all-India consciousness. During
the second half of the nineteenth century, many national
newspapers appeared. The newspaper was used to urge the
people to unite and work for national welfare and to spread the
ideas of autonomy, democracy and industrialization among the
people. The press also enabled national workers living in
different parts of the country to exchange views with each
other.
National literature in the form of novels, essays and
patriotic poems also played an important role in generating
national awareness. The Railways, the Telegraph and a unified
postal system bring together different parts of the country and
helped to foster interaction between people, especially leaders.
The various social-reform and religious-reform
movements that took place in India during the British rule
were a result of the growing national awareness and the spread
of Western liberal thought among the Indian people. These
movements had a greater scope for national expansion and
reconstruction in the social and religious spheres. In the social
sphere, there were moves for caste reform or caste abolition,
equivalent rights for women, campaign against child marriage,
prohibition of remarriage of widows, and campaign against
social and legal inequalities. In the field of religion,
movements arose that opposed religious superstitions and
attacked idolatry, polytheism, and traditional priesthood. These
movements emphasized and fought for the principles of

individual freedom and social equality and stood for

nationalism. The socio-change and religio-change
developments were the declarations of the public arousing in
India and focused on a modification of the medieval social
structure and strict attitude toward a pretty much just premise,
for example on the standard of individual freedom and human
equality.
Nationalism- Different phases
A R Desai points out in his book "social background of
nationalism" on the different phases of Indian nationalism.
Indian nationalism went through various stages of
development. As it progressed from one stage to another, as its
social base expanded, its purpose became more clearly defined,
bolder, and its expressive forms more diverse. As a result of
the influence of the Indian and world development powers, the
growing levels of the Indian people were drawn into the orbit
of the national movement by forming a national consciousness
and vision. This national awakening was manifested in various
spheres of national life, social, political and cultural spheres.
First Phase
In the first phase, Indian nationalism had a very narrow
social base. In the first decades of the nineteenth century, the
intellectuals studied Western culture and absorbed much of its
democratic-national ideas as a result of the modern education
provided by the British in the new educational institutions
established in India. They formed the first level of Indian
society to cultivate national consciousness and aspirations.

Raja Ram Mohan Roy and enlightened Indians were the

pioneers of Indian nationalism. They were advocates of the
concept of Indian nation propagated among the people. They
initiated social-reform and religious-reform movements that
represented efforts to reconstruct Indian society and religion in
the spirit of the new principles of democracy, rationalism and
nationalism. In fact, these movements were a manifestation of
the rising national democratic consciousness among a section
of the Indian people.
These founders and the first fighters of Indian
nationalism stood for democratic rights such as freedom of the
press and raised demands such as the right of the country to
have a voice in governing the country.
Second Phase
The first phase lasted until 1885, which culminated in
the rise of the Indian National Congress that year. The second
phase covers the period from 1885 to 1905.In the second
phase, the leaders of the Indian national movement were the
liberal intellectuals at the helm of the Congress. Their ideology
and methods determined the program and forms of the
movement that reflected the interests of the development of the
new bourgeois society in India. During this period the social
base of the movement extended to the educated middle class,
which by the end of the nineteenth century had grown
tremendously as a result of the development of modern
education, and this period as a result of the growth of Indian
and international trade into a section of the developed
merchant class. During this period modern industries also

gradually grew and as a result the class of industrialists

emerged. They started targeting the Congress, which had
adopted the industrialization program of the country, and in
1905 actively organized the swadeshi campaign.
The Indian National Congress, led by the Liberals,
mainly raised the demands of the educated and the trading
bourgeoisie. The Indian Congress included resolutions
regarding the Indianisation of services, the connection of
Indians with state equipment, and the elimination of economic
drain. It also put forward democratic demands such as
representative institutions and civil liberties.
Unable to integrate socio-state systems, unemployment
among educated middle- class youth increased, and at the end
of the nineteenth century economic devastation among the
people due to devastating epidemics and famines created
favorable conditions for growth. Various unpopular measures,
such as the Indian University Act and the Partition of Bengal,
alienated the people from the government and led to a
politically conscious middle class rally as a result of the
influence of a new group of extremists (leaders as Bal
GangadharTilak, AurobindoGhose, Bipin Chandra Pal, and
LalaLajpat Rai)
Political dissatisfaction was also evident in the growth
of the terrorist movement in the second phase. A small section
of nationalists organized into extremist groups and relied on
methods such as assassinating individual officials and
fomenting riots in the military to gain political independence.

Third phase
The third phase of the development of the national
movement was extended from 1905 to 1918. At this point the
Liberals became the leaders of the national movement. The
national movement registered an advance despite strong
government repression. The political propaganda of the
extremists instilled in the people a sense of national self-
esteem and self-confidence, and instead of looking to the
British for political freedom as advised by the Liberals, they
began to rely on their own strength to achieve it.
In the third phase, the Indian national movement
became extremist and challenging, gaining a broader social
base involving the lower and middle classes. The agitation for
wartime home rule further strengthened the political
consciousness of the people.
It was during this period that the upper caste Muslims
developed political awareness and in 1906 formed their All
India Political Organization, the Muslim League. For a number
of reasons, the growing political awareness of the Muslim elite
and the educated middle class led to the formation of a
community and the formation of their organization on a
community basis.
Fourth Phase
The fourth phase of the evolution of the Indian national
movement began in 1918 and spread to the Non-Cooperation
Movement around 1930-34. A notable development at this
stage was that the national movement gained a broad popular

base. The national movement, which had hitherto been

confined to the upper and middle classes, extended to the
Indian people at this stage. There were many factors that
created a national awakening among the Indian people. The
post-war economic crisis, frustration over government
promises and increased repression by the state have severely
affected the people, including the peasantry and the working
class. Congress raised, the boycott slogans objectively served
the interests of financially supported it. Gandhi's ideology of
class unity and social peace supported the Indigenous
resolution of the Congress in Kolkata. It was from 1918 that
the Indian industrial bourgeoisie began to exert a strong
influence in determining the plans, policies, tactics and forms
of struggle of the Indian National Movement led by the leader
of Gandhi.
Another development at this stage was the growth of
socialist and communist groups in the country. By 1928, these
groups had succeeded in initiating independent political and
trade union movements of the working class based on the
theory of class struggle. They stood for a socialist nation that
proclaimed itself the goal of the Indian national
movement.After 1926, the Indian working class entered the
national movement as an independent political unit. This was a
new phenomenon in the history of the national movement.
It was during this period that the Congress defined its
political goal as independence from the term Swaraj. The
various youth-freedom leagues that have sprung up in the
country have also embraced independence as their political

goal. Parallel to these developments, reactionary community

forces also began to organize themselves during this period.
This period witnessed many communal riots. The first phase of
the civil disobedience movement (1930-34) organized by the
Congress under Gandhi was over. It was the second mass
movement in the history of Indian nationalism.
Fifth Phase
Phase II covers the period from 1934 to 1939, the year
of the outbreak of World War II. Many new developments
took place during this period. A section of Congressmen lost
faith in Gandhi's ideology, programs and methods and formed
the Congress Socialist Party, which stood for the
organizational section from the working class and the
peasantry and made them the driving force of the national
movement. Other dissident tendencies from Gandhism, such as
the Forward Bloc led by Subhash Chandra Bose, also grew.
Another development was the steady growth of the
movements of the depressed sections. Organizationally and
politically, the Muslim League became even stronger in the
last years of this period. In addition, many Muslim
organizations of national and communal political colors
flourished.
The rapid growth of the Communist Party is increasing
its influence among students, workers and Kisans. The rapid
growth of the peasant movement was one of the notable
developments of this period. Large sections of the peasantry
developed national and class consciousness.

The All India Kisan Sabha, an organization of the

conscious section of Indian farmers, was formed for its
purpose by the Socialist Nation of India. It organized the
independent struggles of the Kisans and joined the national
movement as an independent unit.Another notable
development at this stage was the growth of the democratic
struggle of the people of the Indian states with a program that
included demands for the abolition of Indian monopolies,
representative institutions, and civil liberties. The popular
movement in the states was largely controlled by the
merchants of these states. The Indian National Congress
supported and aided the struggle of the people of these states.
Another development during this period was the
growing revival among the nationalities comprising the Indian
people. This awakening was reflected in their demand for
reorganizing the provinces on a linguistic basis. This new
development revealed the advances of nationalities such as
Andhra Pradesh, Oriya and Karnataka, which had awakened
life and felt the urge to integrate into distinct regions of
political governance based on common language.
However, new forces and movements began to put
some pressure on the Indian National Congress, and as a result
included in its program a charter of fundamental rights that
guarantees civil liberties and economic measures that mitigate
workers and peasants. The Indian National Congress, the
country's leading national organization, recognized the cultural
and other aspirations of the awakened nationalities, advocated
for cultural autonomy and linguistic provinces and even

recognized the rights of the population in the provinces.

The second half of the nineteenth century, India
witnessed the full development of national consciousness and
the growth of the organized national movement. Consequences
of Foreign Domination Basically, modern Indian nationalism
emerged to face the challenge of foreign domination. The
conditions of British rule led to the growth of nationalism
among the Indian people. Material assets and the direct and
indirect consequences of British rule provided the moral and
intellectual conditions for the development of a national
movement in India. The national movement was able to inform
people about the exploitation of the British rule. This led to
organized agitations and subsequently led to freedom struggle.
1.2- Indian society in the post Independent era
After independence, Indian society witnessed many
stages with complex realities. Indian society confronted
several significant aspects such as "modernity, nationhood,
Hindu nationalism, caste inequality, the middle class and
globalization" after the rule of colonial countries. The
development of a country is primarily related to the historical
process. The various stages of the historical process shape and
define the nature of society. After the domination of the
colonial rule, the development of economic development gave
impetus and the process of "nation building" led to the
emergence of a new nation with the backing of various
programs. The emerging academic-intellectual sector paved
the way for the strengthening of the nation-building process.

Indian Society- Post independent Period

For communalism or economies are not by any means
the only powers endeavoring to reshape the country: a few
other factors are also work. Of these different powers, five
appear to be vital: the New Economic Policy set up since 1991;
the scope of process approximately named 'globalization'; the
resurgence of caste issues; the rise of the 'new working,
middle, classes' and their changed role; and, as the
consolidated impact of the initial four, a new rationalization of
the Indian nation.
The decolonization process, which matched with the
start of the Cold War, caused the birth of 'Third World'
comprising a large group of new African and Asian countries.
These countries acquired freedom between the last part of the
1940s and the 1960s. From one perspective, decolonization
delivered new expectations and energies in the new countries
over the globe, when vast confidence was being put into the
possibility of boundless material advancement dependent on
scientific and technological advancement. But on the other
side, there was no principal change in the socio-political, and
especially in the economy, as well as it caused the emergence
of disparities between different countries. Deshpande points
out that “Nationalism and independence awakened in the
middle class elites of the third world an intense interest in the
development and modernization of their own society”.
The Nation State acts as the central institution that
provides the nation-geo- economic network and ideological
harmony to a people. It was here that we see varying

ideologies strive for their expression in what would constitute

the popular public imagination and also what kind of
development this nation would take. Advancement in ideology
helps to explain state, country and economy, and play a vital
function in making sure about the soundness of the new post-
colonial countries. Development obtained a ground-breaking
emotive-nationalist charge in India and need to track one of the
significant methods for defeating the diffusive powers of
culture, language, religion, caste and ethnicity. We can see a
bifurcation of roughly two potential options post-self-
governance. One of the views by Gandhian Panchayath system
and other perspectives associated with Nehruvian.
Ideas of Gandhi and Nehru
After independence, and uniquely with the coming of
socialist planning, the recently freed economy comes to be
cherished as the very quintessence of the rising country. This is
the Nehruvian era, socialism, secularism and non-arrangement,
a period when the undertaking of nation building with the
objective of state policy. These three pillars gradually. India
adopted the Nehruvian model in terms of the "socialist pattern"
of society.
Gandhi's vision is in reality more revolutionary – of
having a culture oversee an economy, yet its wistfulness for
certain social relations carries with it a doubt for innovation
and large scale manufacturing – fundamental highlights of any
creating country. The genuine victory of the Nehruvian vision
over the Gandhian nostalgic ideal is found in its capacity to
mix this modernizing cycle with a practically strict criticalness,

an advising sign concerning how this undertaking came to step

into the spot of what religion and convention were once
envisioned to be in the nation. The way that people were eager
to react to the desire of this undertaking is an indication of
their coercion to the power of its course during the post-
autonomy period.
Further, the mainstream accreditations of the
Nehruvian working class are met with a level of doubt given
the way that Deshpande's exact discoveries show that its
commonness aside, it was fundamentally the upper positions
Hindus who had the option to establish themselves as the
heroes of the modernizing cycle and receive the rewards of its
undertakings.
Hence forth the allure of the Gandhian model, with its
accentuation on social relations and shared responsibility in
disobedience of the indifferent laws of the market. Gandhi's
endeavor to imbue the possibility of a non-modern day
economy with a positive and progressive interpretation of the
patriot worldview. This notion of economy based on just and
humane centred. Additionally the ideological worldview of
Nehruvian socialism which cherishes the economy as the
exemplification of the country, and introduced the major
figures such as producers and patriots as its central.
Nehruvian view about modern economy is paired with
a modernized culture that has left behind most of its
conservative traditional beliefs and attitudes. Gandhi’s vision
is the more radical and novel one: he wishes not only to
revitalize traditional culture but also to have it govern the

economy. The Nehruvian model can improve the ideological

effect of the possibility of a cutting edge industrialized
economy by forming it into an amazing vision of the future of
Indian nation.
But we need to remember that the Nehruvian model
didn’t contribute an extensive framework to the construction of
an industrialized nation. The Nehruvian period adequately
shows the centrality of the economy for the patriotism of the
time. The major spatial system of this time is to frontal area the
economy, the country is figured essentially as a financial
space. It is this financial topography that the post-freedom
generation has grown up with.
Nature of class system
Post-independence middle class was entirely a product
of the developmental regime. This was true both at the
ideological and institutional levels.In the way of classical
ideological sense, we can explain the concept of the middle
class according to the nature of different sections. In economic
terms, to recognize groups with shared economic features,
such as levels or sources of income, ownership of particular
kinds of wealth or property, position in the economic structure,
and so on. But socially, it attempts to demarcate groups that
share the same lifestyles, patterns of consumption, or social
attitudes. “‘class’ in Marxism is the theoretical principle by
which society may be divided into distinct groups that: (a) are
identified by their economic role or position, which (b) shapes
the social world they inhabit and the culture they fashion,
which, in turn, (c) moulds their political consciousness and

inspires their actions”.

Marx's underlying excusal of the working class is re-
contextualized utilizing a Gramscian comprehension of how
the working class sustains and directs the predominant
philosophy serving the current social structures. “It is mainly
to Gramsci that we are indebted for seminal insights into the
general importance of the middle classes in creating and
maintaining the dominant ideology that regulates the social
structure”. The segment at that point investigates exactly how
enormous this part might be and thinks about how conceivable
it is that the commonsensical idea of the working classes
currently comprising most of the nation is again a gross
misconception.
The post-free undertaking of building up the state
through the Nehruvian working class likewise contributed this
gathering with the additional ethical authenticity they appear to
order. Consequently working as the class which viably
manages the connection between the decision alliance and the
others it is in a situation to order for itself a proportion of clout
a long ways past its sheer size.
But in contemporary era, the middle class is the class
that articulates the hegemony of the ruling bloc; it both (a)
manifest this hegemony by interpreting the relations of
domination into the language of legitimization; and (b)
conciliate the relationship between classes within the ruling
bloc, as well as between this bloc and other classes
Modernity
The term "Modernity" is one of the questioning aspects

of independent society. The word became commonly and

popularly used after the 20th century. The word, modernity,
was utilized from a nonexclusive perspective to describe the
distinctiveness of any contemporary era so as to recognize it
from past periods.
Modernity has brought to position as a classification, it
is not, at this point effectively looked for as a method for status
by an undeniably metropolitan – which would prefer to
comprise its status as far as class. Who were in a situation to
leave the 'things' of position behind and reconstitute the
methods for their status in class. What this has come about is
that the class of upper standing Hindus is quickly getting
progressively hard to measure given that it is a personality
which they would prefer not partner with themselves. Then
again the abused ranks are set in a place where they have to
declare their (lower) standing qualifications to offer voice to a
specific disparity which is quickly turning out to be
invisibilized. This was especially so after the Mandal
Commission and its subsequent auxiliary intercessions.
Modernity view as local ties and parochial points of
view offer an approach to general duties and cosmopolitan
mentalities. That the individual rather than group the essential
unit of society and politics. The relationship in which men live
and work is founded on decision not by birth. Authority
instead of passivity situates their disposition toward the
material and human condition. The work is isolated from
family, living arrangement, and network of bureaucratic
organizations.

One of the most striking signs denoting the appearance

of modernity in the non- Western world, especially third world
countries, is the emergence of poverty in countries as a social
embarrassment. In Indian context, the discourse of poverty has
a historical background. The book, The poverty and Unbritish
rule in India, by Dadabhai Naoroji, portrays British rule as the
cause of poverty in India.
We also need to consider modernity within the context
of revolutionizing modes of governance with the emergence of
democracy, the modern nation-state and its institutional
apparatus. The technological advancement and capability, the
emergence of new social organization as well as the systemic
will-to-power to comprehensively reconstruct the whole world
in its own image. In Third World countries, the possibility of
development is something considerably more than only a lot of
monetary policies or processes. It is one of the vital
components that empower a national collectivity to be
envisioned into reality.
The new financial policies have debilitated the prior
worldview in their own particular manner. In the current
strategy system, just those makers are esteemed who produce
for the worldwide market and get unfamiliar trade. Along these
lines, it's anything but a maker's capacity to fulfill the
requirements of the country, yet rather his/her capacity to react
to the necessities of a theoretical 'worldwide market' that is
unequivocal.
Overview of caste system
Deshpande addressed one of the questions that why

caste was almost invisible in urban middle-class contexts? The

most important reason, of course, is that these contexts were
overwhelmingly dominated by the upper castes. This
homogeneity made caste drop below the threshold of social
visibility. If almost everyone around is upper-caste, caste
identity is unlikely to be an issue. Though castes are practically
separated and supplement one another, the most clear
representation of this being the notable in specialization or
division-of-labour version of caste.
During the Nehruvian period, the public agreement on
standing appeared to be considerably more exhaustive and
solid than the one on secularism. Caste was among the couple
of customary institutions that were introduced as all awful, as
'social evils' with no reclaiming highlights.
The new generation in Nehruvian India, and especially
to the individuals who were raised in a generally upper-caste
however recently metropolitan and recently proficient middle
class condition, caste was an antiquated idea. It seemed to have
no active role in urban everyday life.
The dynamic abhorrence towards position after
independence was the joint result of, first, the patriot
development and its mission against differentiations, and,
second, a response against what were viewed as colonial
policies to make and hone divisions among the Indian public.
One of the uncomfortable truths that caste inequality has been
and is being reproduced in independent India. Even in its
present form the NSSO data offers plenty of evidence pointing
to the continued existence of a massive caste divide in India in

the twenty- first century. Even in contemporary society, we

can see the presence of caste inequality among the privileged
sections of the population.
An influential strand of recent scholars has argued that
the institution of caste as we know it today is largely a modern
and specifically colonial invention. In this view, the policies of
the colonial state like census, caused to codify and document
various caste and colonial forms of knowledge like
Anthropology, considered it as an essence that defined Indians
and Indian culture.
Emergence Hindutva and Globalization
The first through the history of independent India, the
country confronted various 'enormous' issues that looked and
were more social instead of financial. Secessionist
developments in Punjab and Kashmir dependent on ethnic-
religious identity; the Mandal contention and the interruption
of rank into an as far as anyone knows position less
metropolitan working class milieu; the coming of Hindutva
and its rise of the collective partition on to all important focal
point in the Indian politics.
The decay of Nehruvian developmentalism implies that
the economy can no longer capacity as a significant ideological
asset for envisioning the country. Two key developments
underline this appraisal: the resurgence of Hindutva as an
elective method of envisioning the Indian country; and the
'supportive of globalization economic approaches that have
been followed with noteworthy consistency by totally different
political systems since the 1990s.

It is in these arrangements of conditions where finds in

India a forceful 'return of the subdued' communicated in the
resurgence of Hindu communalism in the 1980's. Deshpande
reviews the spatial techniques Hindu communalism takes up to
settle to its advantage and re-establish a thought of India an
alternate way from that of the Nehruvian mainstream innovator
vision. It comprehensively has been portrayed as a cycle of
'serious desecularization' of the open arena and a re-
sacralization of the country as pace. Genealogically it draws
from the compositions of Vinayak Damodar Savarkar, a Hindu
patriot. Indicative of its endeavors are the occasions of 1992
Ayodhya controversy.
Deshpande inspects the inquisitive and hastily opposite
connection between what globalization obviously appears to
do to societies and Hindutva's cases of the provincial
essentialism of a 'Hindu' culture. One of the impacts of
globalization is that of social versatility. The expanding
conveyability and the burst between a culture and it's
indegenousity to a topographical area likewise emerges the
state of what various scholars allude to as a 'nervousness of
character' resulting from the void of the unnecessary
personality which we have for ourselves today. Further, this
deterritorialization of culture has additionally given an
attractive open door which media and the travel industry
money in on by selling a 'credible exoticism' – the 'genuine'
Indian experience and so on. This uneasiness from various
perspectives powers the need to build a basic and diasporic
personality. The most striking advancement which outlines the

degree of this deterritorialization is the development of a

non-occupant Hindutva – a transnational power which may
really impact neighborhood wonders.
The spatial systems of Hindutva have significantly
affected contemporary Indian culture and political issues. “If
the nation-space in Savarkar’s Hindutva was based on a sacred
geography, the Nehruvian nation-space was shaped by an
economic geography”. This proposal declares that just those
set apart by Hindutva have the moral and political rights to
establish the country, since their secular and religious -cultural
interests are attempted to allude to a similar topographical
space. The essential spatial strategy behind idea of Hindutva is
the redefinition of the country as a sacrosanct space: the case
that the country is framed looking like a punyabhoomi, a holy
land.
Deshpande isn't to recommend, notwithstanding, that
Hindutva and globalization were exclusively responsible for
the decrease of Nehruvian developmentalism. As the inside
issues of this worldview were likewise critical to the decrease
of the previous belief system.
The building of a strong nation in India after the end of
colonial rule is on the threshold of a new era. As a new
country, India faced many problems at the formation of a
unified nation. However, to some extent, India has been able to
address and overcome these problems. Indian intellectuals and
leaders tried to build a new nation of secular and democratic
values. It also influenced the development of economic,
political and cultural spheres of Indian society.

MODULE 2
APPROACHES TO THE STUDY OF
INDIAN SOCIETY- I
Sociology in India is a recently originated discipline

which studies the society, social interaction social relationship
etc. The module mainly discusses the development of
Sociology in India and the various approaches, which
influence the development of Sociology for India. Even though
the Sociology is a western discipline, the approaches like
contextualization and indigenization helps to the development
of Sociology for India. Contextualization and indigenization
are the two approaches highly influence the development of
Sociology for India and these approaches highlights the use of
Indian resources for development of Sociology in India.
Sociology is not merely an academic discipline it has various
application in real life situations of individual so the study of
development of Sociology in India deserves relevance in
present day society. The module gives an idea about the
development of Sociology for India and the outlook about
various approaches make sense about Indian society, how
these approaches helps to develop Sociology in India.
Development of sociology in India
Sociology is a relatively young discipline. Although its
roots can be traced back to about three or four centuries ago, it
was only in the nineteenth century that it started assuming its
present role as a science of society in the sense of a systematic

study of all societies in space and time. However, we are not

concerned here with tracing the development of sociology and
social anthropology in the West and shall merely confine
ourselves to a few general historical statements. In India,
sociology is a comparatively late entrant into the academic
world. But its origin can be traced back to the days when the
British colonial power realized that the knowledge of Indian
social life and culture was an essential requirement for the
maintenance of its dominance. Since then, it has made
phenomenal growth and, in the process, has shown sufficient
competence to adapt itself to shifts in the socio- political
structure. Sociology in India has tried to answer questions
relevant to the discipline by locating itself in the particular
context of the Indian society. In this manner it is contributing
to universal sociological knowledge from the bottom upwards,
as it were, instead of presuming a universal view from the
findings and generalizations appropriate to one particular
society or to a set of similar societies e.g. the "American"
society or the "Western" societies. M.N Srinivas also viewed
that the origins of sociology in India goes back to the days
when British officials discovered that knowledge of Indian
culture and social institutions was essential for the smooth
functioning of government. In 1769, Harry Verelst, the
Governor of Bengal and Bihar realized the need, and stressed
the importance of collecting information regarding the leading
families and their customs in his directives to revenue
supervisors. Since then many British officials and missionaries
had made serious efforts to collect and record information
regarding the life and culture of their Indian subjects. It is

therefore evident that Sociology as a discipline is not very old

in India. However, despite of its recent emergence it has
undergone a considerable expansion. Before independence
sociology was confined only to a few university departments.
It began in a modest way in the years between the two World
Wars. Indian sociologists like Radhakamal Mukherjee, G. S.
Ghurye, D. P. Mukherjee were pioneers of the discipline. A
widespread need for sociological research was felt only with
India's independence, and with the launching of a program of
planned development. In recent times, many Indian
universities have separate departments of Sociology, and
besides, there are research institutions where sociology has an
important place. It is very important for every student of
sociology to know both the intellectual tradition and the
institutional growth of the discipline. Before discussing the
intellectual tradition, this chapter will give a brief sketch of the
historical development of the discipline in India.
Ramakrishna Mukherjee has distinguished three stages
in the historical development of Indian sociology as follows:
i) Proto-professional stage of sociology prior to the twentieth
century.
ii) Professional stage of descriptive and explanatory
sociology in the first half of the present century.
iii) Currently needed stage of diagnostic sociology.
On the other hand, some other scholars have
distinguished the development of Sociology in India as
follows:

i) 1773-1900 A.D when their foundations were laid;

ii) 1901-1950 A.D when they became professionalized (pre-
independence years)
iii) The post-Independence years,
When a complex of forces including the under taking
of planned development by the government, the increased
exposure of Indian scholars to the work of their foreign
colleagues, and the availability of funds, resulted in
considerable research activity. This period can be again
subdivided into the following phases: a) Developments in the
Seventies b) Perspectives in the Eighties c) Imperatives in the
Nineties.
IV) Sociological Research in India. However, we can
understand the development of sociology in India with the help
of different stages as discussed below.
Proto-professional stage (1773-1900 A.D. when their
foundations were laid) According to Mukherjee the first stage
can be considered as "protoprofessional" because it
characterizes the period of data collection, description, and
explanation which are of sociological importance but not yet
used for the consolidation of a distinct branch of knowledge. In
this period, sociology was submerged in the governmental
reports and surveys on the life of the people and in the papers
and monographs on the same subject but under the label of
antiquity or Indology, and later of economic or ''social"
studies. Two distinct demands dominated this stage: (I) the
requirement of the State Polity to learn about the people for an

efficient governance, and (ii) the desire of the Social Polity to

know about itself. It is utmost important to mention that both
were prevalent from remote periods in India's history. Here we
can cite the example of Kautilya (B C. 300-400 B.C.) who
advised the king to collect data about the country and the
people. Kautilya’s treatise Arthasastra contains a substantial
amount of aforesaid information. In addition, a well-known
treatise of this kind, written during the reign of Akbar (1556-
1605) is Abul Fazl's Ain-i-Akbari. The British realized the
same need as felt by the previous rulers. Therefore, with the
consolidation of their power, firstly in Bengal, Governor Harry
Verelst asked the revenue supervisors in 1769 to collect
information on the leading Indian families and their customs
which has been already mentioned in the previous sections.
The procedure was later extended by the East India Company
(and afterwards by the British Imperial Government) to all
classes of people in India, and thus resulted in the collection of
a wealth of sociological data as contained in the British
Parliamentary papers and reports, etc. However, during that
period, the Indian social polity found a new interest to learn
about itself. "Confronted by the disturbing scene of what
seemed superior social organization as well as superior
material culture, Indian thinkers began to look at their own
family, law, education, and religion in ways different from
those sanctioned by century-old tradition. This outlook
ultimately, brought to the forefront of the Indian society by
persons, like, Raja Rammohan Roy (1772-1833), Swami
Dayanand Saraswati, (1824- 1883), Mahadev Govinda Ranade
(1842-1901), Swami Vivekananda (1863-1902), led to the

collection and collation of new empirical data as well as

documentary evidence and to reinterpretation of India's
religions and ethic, customs and institutions, etc., which are of
no less sociological relevance. It is important to mention some
important incidents like for example, Rammohan Roy is
reported to have had collected data on the widows who were
burnt on their husband's pyre, while he reinterpreted Hinduism
in the light of universalism in religion and wrote on the utility
of English education as a gateway to the Western knowledge
in science. Ishwar Chandra Vidyasagar (1820-1891) not only
adduced evidence from scriptures in favor of widow marriage
and against polygyny but also collected empirical data on child
widows and supplied statistics to support his statement that
polygyny was prevalent in the 1860-s among the Bengali Kulin
Brahmins. Therefore, the initial development of sociology in
India was closely linked with the Indian Renaissance. Raja
Rammohan Roy is considered to be the most prominent figure
of Indian Renaissance. However, this trend was not lost in late
years. And the role of the national movement for independence
was also considered to be significant for the growth of Indian
sociology in the 19th and 20th centuries, as stated by the
founders of professional sociology in India, like, Brojendra
Nath Seal, Benoy Kumar Sarkar, Radhakamal Mukherjee.
Also, there are evidences to indicate that one of the by-
products of the mass movement of the 1920s, led by Gandhi,
was to stimulate the interest of the social scientists in "village
studies" and, since India's independence (1947), national issues
have markedly influenced sociological research on India, as is
evident from the published literature. According to Mukherjee

Indian sociology has been geared to the task of answering the

"Indian question" in different contexts—colonial or otherwise,
etc. from the beginning to date.
Professional Stage or Sociology in Pre-Independence
India (1901- 1950 A.D.) the emergence of Sociology in India
dates to 1914 when, the Government of India gave a grant to
the University of Bombay for starting the teaching of
sociology, and a course of lectures in sociology and economics
was offered to post-graduate students in the same year. Later in
1919, a department of sociology and civics was founded under
the leadership of Patrick Geddes who was succeeded as head
of the department, in I924, by G. S. Ghurye. Under Ghurye's
leadership, Bombay became the leading centre for sociology,
especially research, in the country. The establishment of this
department was a landmark in the development of sociology in
India. Sociology was at first a part of the M.A. course along
with economics, and only in the late 1930s, a full, eight-paper
M.A. course in sociology was introduced. It was followed by
the introduction of Sociology in several other Universities of
the country in the subsequent years. Lucknow was another
centre of sociology and anthropology. In 1921, a combined
department of economics and sociology was started by the
University with Radhakamal Mukherjee as professor and head.
He was joined a year later by D. P. Mukherjee and in 1928 by
D. N. Majumdar who was appointed to a lectureship on
"primitive economy". These three men with their endeavor
made Lucknow an influential centre of teaching and research
in sociology and anthropology. In Lucknow, sociology had

only a minor place in the curriculum and until the 1940s there
was no separate paper in the subject in the B.A. degree and
only one paper in the M.A. degree. In Bombay, sociology had
from the outset a more important place and made some
advances; there were four sociology papers in the M.A. degree,
and after 1924 it became possible to take the degree entirely in
sociology by submitting a thesis. However, later changes
established sociology as an independent subject for both M.A.
and Ph.D. degrees. The University of Bombay became, in fact,
the centre of sociological studies in India, and it was there that
many of the older generation of university teachers received
their first training. Therefore, it can be mentioned that the
Indian sociology attained a professional character when the
University of Bombay started a postgraduate course in
economics and sociology in 1914, the University of Calcutta
began to teach sociology to the post-graduate students from
1917, and an undergraduate course in sociology was
introduced in Mysore University in 1917. The students
produced in these centers, especially in Bombay and Calcutta,
headed new centers of sociological study and research in
Lucknow, Poona, Baroda, Delhi, etc.; and the latter centers
(especially the Lucknow centre) accelerated the
professionalization of sociology in India. In the first half of the
present century, however, teaching of sociology in India was
either linked with economics or social anthropology, or it had a
strong antecedence of idealistic philosophy. It is very
important to mention here about the major professional body
of sociologists in India i.e., Indian Sociological Society which
consists of membership of more than 3,200, drawn from all

parts of the country. It was established in 1951 in Bombay

with the initiative of Govind Sadashiv Ghurye, the then
Professor and Head of the Department of Sociology,
University of Bombay (now University of Mumbai). The
Society started the journal Sociological Bulletin in 1952 and
during the first decade or so of their existence both the Society
and its journal were nurtured in the Department by the
meticulous efforts of Ghurye. In 2011, both the Indian
Sociological Society and the Sociological Bulletin has
successfully completed sixty years of their existence.
Sociology in Post-Independence India: The
institutionalization and professionalization of sociology in
India can be clearly divided into two phases—before 1950 and
after. In the pre- 1950 phase, there were only a few centers of
study in sociology besides Bombay, Calcutta and Lucknow.
The actual phase of expansion of sociology began in 1952.
Several factors have contributed towards the rapid growth of
the discipline during this period. We can mention about the
interest of the central government to promote social science
research through a formal organization established for the
purpose. Dhanagare viewed that the policy makers of
independent India pursued objectives of economic
regeneration and social development, and they recognized the
role of the social sciences in attaining the objectives of
national reconstruction and development. Since the policy
makers rightly viewed education and development as inter-
related, various branches of social sciences assumed
importance and received impetus after 1950. In addition the

Government of India had officially undertaken program of

plan development. Its five-year plan started in 1952 and
sociology and social anthropology were seen as a source of
possible expertise on ‘social aspects of development, its
determinants and consequences’. The need to study the impact
of development programs on different sections of society, and
for program evaluation was so enormous that it created a
considerable increase in the demand for trained personnel in
sociology and social anthropology. Therefore, the growing
needs of planners and administrators on one hand, and the
realization of increasing importance of social science research
in the planning process on the other hand, created
opportunities for research projects. However, the rising
importance of social science research also resulted in the
establishment of research institutes. The development of
research activity also meant the enlargement of employment
opportunities at all levels.
Intellectual tradition
Now coming to the intellectual tradition of Indian
sociology we can say that, like most other social sciences in
India, sociology is very much influenced by Western
philosophical and social scientific traditions. Therefore, some
scholars have challenged the borrowed theoretical and
methodological assumptions. However, in recent time three
main trends of thought can be distinguished about Indian
sociology:
I) Social anthropological
II) Philosophical

III) Influence of western sociology.

The first may be called the Social anthropology, which
developed more vigorously than Sociology before I947, and it
has been a major intellectual influence in the expansion of
Sociology. There are of course several reasons for this
influence. Many of the social institutions and social problems
of India which call for sociological investigation can very
usefully be studied by anthropological methods and in terms of
anthropological concepts. It would be pertinent to mention
about the study of caste and joint family thoroughly in a single
village. The findings of such studies may contribute to a better
understanding of the phenomena in a wider context. A recent
review of studies of caste in India, by M. N. Srinivas and
others shows very well how the thorough investigation of caste
in the village has led to revision of some earlier conceptions of
the caste system. The anthropological field-studies in various
institutions have led to the pulling down book-view and
revision of some earlier misapprehension.
The second trend of thought is philosophical. A group
of sociologists at the University of Lucknow influenced by the
work of D.P Mukherjee took an interest in logical and
methodological problems. They are very much critical about
sociological positivism and scientism. They attempted to
develop a sociological theory which would be rooted in India’s
social history and closely related with traditional social
thought. However, it would be wrong to assume them to be
close-minded in outlook. They were very much aware of
Western sociology and philosophy. In some respect their views

resemble those of 19th century German critic of positive

sociology, Wilhelm Dilthey. Rather than going for a revision
of the logic and methods of sociology, they seemed to involve
in interpretation of the moral and religious principles which
underlie social order. The principal value that may be
attributed to the work which was being done in Lucknow is
that it will encourage new and better study in the field of
historical studies which is somewhat untouched.
The third trend of Indian sociology is directly
attributable to the influence of recent Western sociology,
particularly American Sociology. So far, it represents not so
much a coherent body of thought as a general attitude of
approval towards field research involving quantitative methods
and towards scientific procedure involving the formulation and
testing of hypotheses. The increasing acquaintance with
modern technique of research has coincided with the modern
demands of public bodies for factual information in many
areas of life. At present Indian sociologists are well prepared to
conduct large-scale comparative studies. In addition,
sociological methods of investigation have attained a
recognized place along with anthropological methods.
Although all these three trends of thought have
developed independently, they have not been exclusive. Nor
the advocates of one thought inhibited research in other
conceptual frameworks.
Contextualization
It is another approach put forwarded by Indian
sociologists during the early emergence of Sociology, for

studying social reality. Contextualization simply means to

relate some events or phenomena with the contexts. Mainly
two methods like field view and text or book view are used by
the thinkers in sociology for making sense of social reality.
The book view does not reflect the reality and the field view to
get facts. Field view closely related with the contextualization.
Sociology in India has been about a century old now. In
the beginning for about six to seven decades sociologists have
been working under the influence of western theories and
methods. Most of them tried to evolve some approaches to
study Indian society and culture. T K Oommen an Indian
sociologist said that so far in past six decades the context of
sociology has been to study order and change and may be
direction of change. Oommen identified five broad strands of
thinking found in India that is given below:
1. The traditionalist- who emphasized upon uniqueness of
Indian culture and civilization and studying Indian society
as a whole.
2. The nationalist- who emphasized upon the analysis
through history and tradition and away from the influence
of outsiders
3. The nativist- who wanted to use native categories to
reconstruct social reality as people perceives it.
4. The cosmopolitans – Who wanted to focus on general and
the present, they tend to be a historical.
5. The radicals-Who call for a selective rejection of the
outside influence.

Within the context of history, colonialism and its

impact on the intellectual and cultural traditions in India, of
which sociology and other social sciences are at a certain level
of manifestations, provides an important historical backdrop
for its theoretic, ideological and professional education. The
analysis of major theoretic orientation is not possible without a
framework of sociology of knowledge within the context of
history. Radhakamal Mukherjee, B N Seal and B K Sarkar
continuously refuted the efforts of Western ideologists. Seal
thought that institutions could only be compared when there
were historically coexisted and parallel. To Mukherjee,
Indian social institutions are unique. Therefore the study of
any society should do in the particular context of that society.
Ideology, theory and method are related to the context.
Without the context there is no relevance of any ideology
theory and method. Certain important Indian sociologists’
contributions applied contextual approach,, which are leading
to emergence of sociology are discussed here.
R K Mukherjee has focus much in the study of Indian
culture, civilization, art and architecture. His vision of
sociology is deep rooted in the Indian tradition. G S Ghurye
another sociologist insists Indian contexts in his writings.
Caste and Race in India is an important work picturise the
Indian context. Culture and society is another work of Ghurye,
which discuses the Indian societal structure. Louis Dumont
French sociologist the Indian social context is influence him,
which is reflected in his writings. He learnt Sanskrit to
understand to understand the ancient texts of Hindu society.

His primary focus was to study the caste system in India. M N

Srinivas a famous Indian sociologist explains the Indian
context through his work. Religion and society among Coorgs
of South India, Social change in Modern India are the
important works of him, which highlights the importance of
Indian context. A R Desai Indian sociologist much interested
in the study of peasants in India, social movements and Indian
national movement. His emphasize was to study the Indian
society through Marxian approach. Yogendra Singh another
well known Indian sociologist emphasize on culture and
tradition of Indian society. His first book Modernization of
Indian Tradition explained the concept of social change and
modernization in India. Culture and change is another book
defined the cultural change, it reckoned Indian culture has
closely related with the context in India. Contextualization is
an approach in Indian sociology which is support the
Indological approach. This mainly highlights each and every
phenomenon closely related with particular context in a
specific society, without connecting context all phenomena are
meaningless.
Even though contextualization positively influence the
emergence of sociology in India T K Oommen said that
contextualization of sociology in India involves many
problems. Differential analysis is given to the study of past and
present, ideology and sociology, tradition and change. He said
that D P Mukherjee emphasized on studying tradition but
Dumont said that a sociology of India lies at the point of
confluence of sociology and Indology. Oommen opined that

those who emphasizes the study of Indology suggest that this

is the surest way to understand Indian social reality as a whole
but to the extent the texts which are actually to be studied are
invariably Hindu texts, they provide leads a Hindu sociology
and not for the roader Indian sociology. Those who invoke
Hindu religious texts to understand the values of Indian
society, if not the facts assume that Hinduism is the most
ancient religion of India, an assumption not entirely
uncontested. It is necessary to refer here to the religions in
India in terms of their sources of presence. They may be
categorized as follows:
1. The primal vision of indigenous social categories such as
Adivasis and Dalits
2. The earliest migrant religion which got nativised and
emerged as the dominant religion : Hinduism
3. The religions which emerged as the resultant of protest
against Hinduism: Jainism, Buddhism, Sikhism
4. The religions which are perceived to be the products of
conquest or colonization: Islam & Christainity.
5. The religious groups which came as migrant: Jews,
Zoroastrians and followers of Bahai faith.
The first three categories of religions are usually
considered as Indian religions not only in popular perception
but also in terms of constitutional provisions. On the other
notwithstanding the fact that Christianity came to India in the
first century A. D and Islam is in India for thirteen centuries.
Similarly while 80% of world’s Zorastrians live in India and

Buddhism is practically an expatriate religion from India. In

the lights of emphasizing Hindu texts, Pali and Gurmukhi texts
are ignored therefore Hindu texts would only give an
understanding of values of the mainstream people of present
day in India- the twice born Hindus inhabiting Indo- Gangetic
plain.
In this argument text and field assume significance.
Oommen says that excessive dependence on the book is the
characteristic feature of theology and law which attempt norm
setting and value giving. The book view does not reflect the
reality and the field view to get facts. Oommen strongly feels
that sociology must emphasize upon contextualization that is
the study of multiple Indian reality and structure. The process
of contextualization of sociology in India involves (a)
recognition of fact that tradition or past contains both assets
and liabilities views in terms of the present needs and
aspirations. (b) Appropriate values and institutions from other
societies and culture should be judiciously integrated into India
society. (c) Recognizing the tendency of gradual adaptation
and reconciliation of Indian society and recognizing the fact
that social transformation in India takes place at a slower pace.
Indigenization
Indigenization is an approach developed to study the
Sociology in Indian context. In common parlance the word
indigenization refers to the act of making something more
native; transformation of ideas to suit a local culture.
Therefore, the indigenization of Sociology refers to the
changes brought to the discipline to suit the local situation.

Indigenization of social sciences started in the post-colonial

era. One inescapable crisis in social sciences in Asia is
associated with indigenization. The native scholars have raised
their voice against the use of borrowed methods and
campaigned for the use of native or indigenous techniques of
research. The question of indigenization has been also
discussed in quite a lot of national and international meetings.
The movement of indigenization gained momentum in the first
part of the 1970s. In Asia, the concern was expressed at the
first Asian Conference on Teaching and Research in Social
Sciences organized in 1973 in Shimla. The concern for
indigenization was also shown by the Conference of National
Social Science Councils. The demand for indigenization is an
invitation to re-examine the very structure of social science in
general, and sociology in particular, to evolve suitable
strategies for their promotion in challenging situation of
modern times. The alienating character of sociology in India is
manifested in the fact that it is used most often as instrument
of domination and tyranny rather than as a pursuit for
liberation. So, there arose the need for indigenization. In its
extreme formulation it appears almost like a revolt against the
dominance of Western concepts, theories and methodologies
which were described as irrelevant and unsuitable in Asian
context. Many scholars criticized the quality of work done by
foreigners of their society on one hand and blind imitation of
foreign models by local scholars who had been trained abroad
on the other hand. It is argued that there is considerable
misinterpretation of reality in the writings of outsiders seeing it
with different cultural lens. They are unable to go beyond

surface and detect deeper meanings. It is also important to

mention here that the call for indigenization has addressed
different aspects as it means different things to different
people.
Yogesh Atal an Indian sociologist who identified the
four features of Indigenization; it is the positive characteristics
supported by other proponents. These features are given
below:
1. Indigenization is a plea for self-awareness and rejection of
a borrowed consciousness. It emphasizes the need for an
insider view, its proposers wanted to analyze their own
societies replacing the existing trend of knowing their
society via west.
2. Indigenization advocates the desirability for alternative
perspectives on human societies with a view to making the
social science less parochial. This would improve the
quality of professionalism.
3. It draws the attention to cultural and historical specificities
and tries to develop dynamic perspective on national
problems.
4. It should not have too narrow parochialism leading to
fragmentation of a single definition into several insulated
system of thought based on geographical boundaries. It is
opposed to both false universalism and false nationalism.
The word indigenization is generally preferred to
endogenous development which means the development
generated from within and orthogenetically and which is free

from any kinds of external influences. Indigenization however

honestly alludes to outside contact by emphasizing the need for
indigenization of the exogenous elements to suit local
requirements. The question of indigenization has become a
matter of concern in global level. For indigenizing the sources
of knowledge various measure are taken by different countries
like teaching in national language and use of local materials,
research by insiders, determination of research priorities,
theoretical and methodological re-orientation.
Social sciences are largely western oriented and it
gained popularity in non-western countries without any
alteration of their western orientation. The situation of
Sociology was not different from that, the Indian scholars were
very much influenced by the western scholars and many of
them trained in abroad and try to apply that knowledge in
Indian context. Even after independence, there was not any
significant change in academic culture of India. Social science
and Sociology retained link with the high learning centers of
the west. The blind imitation of western methodology led to
distortion of perspective and falsification of generalization.
The growth of Sociology also remained stunted as the native
Sociology operated within parameters set by others and could
not see the challenges and opportunities inherent in their own
social situation. The result of its imitative research was
doubtful because of their inappropriate conceptual and
methodological foundation. Indigenization aimed at a
redefinition of focus and purposive efforts to develop a
dynamic perspective on national problems and critical issue of

public and society.

The debate in 50s and 60s was whether Sociology in
India should have a universal character or it should be unique
in nature owing to the uniqueness of Indian society. The
question in fact appeared in books and journals. There was also
division among the scholars regarding the issue of
indigenization. Let us have a look at the views of some
eminent sociologists. A R Desai advocates the orthodox
Marxist approach as the most appropriate approach for
analyzing Indian society and State. G S Ghurye emphasizes the
traditional perspective like Saxena and Saran. M N Srinivas
used British structural-functional approach for analyzing
Indian society.
Indological Approach
Indological approach is one important approach to
study Indian society. It assumes that historically Indian society
and culture are unique. In this approach the Indian society are
studied by interpretation of ancient texts such as Vedas,
Puranas, Manusmriti, Ramayana etc. so this approach known
as textual perspective or book view. The uniqueness or
specificity of Indian social realities are could be understood
only with the help of ancient texts. Therefore Indologists use
the literature of ancient Indian society such as ancient history,
epics, religious manuscripts and texts etc. to study the social
institutions of India. Sanskrit scholars and Indologists widely
used this approach for knowledge production. Besides them,
many sociologists have extensively used this approach to study
Indian society. Indology in the tradition of Max Muller is

commonly understood as a discipline that studies traditional

Indian society mostly Hindu ideology, values, institutions and
cultural norms and practices through careful examination of
classical sacred texts. Indological approach has also been the
hallmark of several sociologists like Dumont, Ghurye, Pocock,
Iravati Karve, K M Kapadia, etc. Indological approach has
been playing a dominant role in understanding the Indian
social institutions since colonial time to present time. As part
of the colonial administration, British officials and scholars
used this approach to study the life and culture of people in
India. In another section let us discuss the contributions of two
sociologists like Louis Dumont and G S Ghurye which applied
Indological approach.
Louis Dumont
Louis Dumont, a French sociologist who was born in
1911 and died in 1988. He is an eminent figure in the field of
Sociology. He is regarded as an Indologist, Social
Anthropologist as well as a structuralist. Dumont’s academic
career began in mid 1930s under the guidance of Marcel
Mauss who was a leading sociologist. It was Dumont who first
brought high sociological theory to bear on the caste system
focusing on its empirical specifics. Caste, Hinduism, kinship,
social and political movements etc. are important areas of
interest of him. Homo Hierarchicus: The caste system and its
implications is an important work of him which explains the
caste as a social stratification system in India and its
implication for Hindu society and allied groups. Hierarchy and
Marriage alliance in South India and Homo Acqualis are the

two other prominent work of him.

Dumont considered as the first Indologist giving a
theoretical account of caste system where he was mostly
concerned with the ideology of caste system. But he isn’t
defining caste; he observes that the Western scholars’
definition of caste as a type of social stratification is socio-
centric. According to Dumont the caste system cannot be
interpreted and understood from the point of western ideas of
egalitarianism, individualism and pre- eminence of politics and
economics on society. Caste stands for inequality in theory and
practices both, but it is not simply an opposite of equality. He
viewed that the ideology of caste system in India is purely
religious and this religious outlook determines the situation.
Dumont adopts the methodology of structural-functionalism in
his analysis of the caste system.
Homohierarchicus, Purity-Pollution
The Homohierarchicus: The caste system and its
implications (1966) is the prominent work of Dumont, in
which he tries to picturise caste as Indian phenomenon. It is an
unusual work in its conception, design and execution. It gives
new ideas and vision of social structure in caste system.
Hierarchy is said to distinguish Indian society from modern
societies whose fundamental principle in equality. The book
mainly analyses the caste system in India, the hierarchy has a
pivotal role in Indian caste system. The people who are
arranged in the low position of hierarchy of the system are
disadvantageous and the object to the system and they
struggled the existing oppressions created by elites, those who

arranged in top position of hierarchy.

Dumont claimed that his knowledge of caste system in
India derived from purely Indian sources, thereby discovering
the truth which has escaped those less capable than of
transcending their modern western biases. Caste in India is
based on the opposition or dualities of purity and pollution. It
is always the opposition between two extreme categories. The
Brahmins being the higher caste and having priestly job are
considered to be pure. The untouchables being at the lower
rank and doing the menial jobs are considered to be the
impure. These untouchables are always left at a segregated
place from villages along with various kinds of imposition on
them. They are being restricted from the access of common
places like temple, public well etc. This pure, impure notion
not only confined among individuals and labour but the objects
like silk is pure than cotton, metals like gold is pure than silver
etc.
Dumont was primarily concerned with the ideology of
caste system. He considered caste as a set of relationships of
economic, political and Kinship system, sustained by certain
values which are mostly religious in nature. Dumont says that
caste is not a form of stratification system but a form of
inequality.
Indological approach is a way of looking the
phenomena on the basis of ancient Indian texts, literatures and
books. This approach highly influences the development of
Sociology for India. Dumont analyzed the Indian social
structure applying Indological approach, mainly analyzed

caste, village structure etc. He studied Sanskrit for analyzing

the ancient Indian texts. Even though he was a French scholar,
he studied caste system in India through analyzing the
Indological sources.
G S Ghurye
Govind Sadasiva Ghurye was born on 12th December
1893 in a Brahmin family in Maharashtra and died in 1984 in
Bombay. He is known as the father of Indian Sociology and
Doyen of Indian sociologists for his contribution to Indian
Sociology. He played a leading role in establishing the Indian
Sociological Society (ISS) in 1952 and its flagship journal
Sociological Bulletin. He has greatly interested in world
civilization and particularly in Hindu civilization. His focus
was on the Indo-Aryan civilization and its evolution in India.
Ghurye tried to focus on various important aspects like Indo-
Aryan civilization likes evolution of caste, family structure and
its relationship with Indo-European family structure.
According to him the duty of sociologists is to explore the
social history of the past. He was not only concerned with past
evolution but also with the contemporary problems of his time.
His work The Burning Cauldron of North East India is the best
example of his interest in contemporary issues. His range of
interest is very wide therefore; his writings have enormous
diversity of themes and perspectives. Caste, tribe, kinship,
family, marriage, civilization etc. are some important themes
of writings of Ghurye. Caste and Race in India (1932) is a well
known work of his which studies caste system in India. Even
today the social scientists used this as a classical work to

understand caste and its characteristics as a social institution

and stratification system. Culture and society, Indian Sadhus,
Cities and civilization, Family and Kin in Indo-European,
Scheduled Tribes, and Indian Acculturation etc. are the certain
prominent work written by Ghurye. Ghurye stated that the
main task of sociologists was exploring the social history. So
he observed the similarities between sociology and history. He
realized that India has many facts to tell the world about its
early social institutions and development. Therefore, for
Ghurye Indology was inevitable for doing sociology in India.
According to Ghurye Indian society is a Hindu society
and it cannot be understood without understanding Hindu
tradition. The guiding force in Indian society was Hindu
ideology. He also emphasized on understanding of order and
change in society. Order is understood in terms of specific
aspects of society like — caste, religion, village, tribe,
urbanization etc. He took a dynamic view of Indian society,
not only in terms of continuities from the past, but also in
terms of understanding the process of change in terms of
British influence. The process of change is understood in terms
of changing Hindu tradition and he refrains from mentioning
any great modernizing influence of British rule. He has deep
knowledge in Sanskrit language so he read ancient text wrote
in Sanskrit and Pali for understanding Indian social life and
culture. According to him the study of Indian society is not
complete without deeply understanding the Indian social
structure and culture from Indian perspectives. Indian
perspectives mainly developed through reading and analyzing

of ancient texts and literatures written by people in India.

Origin and Features of caste system
Caste and Race in India (1932) is the well known work
of Ghurye, the sociologists and philosophers considered this
text as a classical book for analyzing the caste system in India.
The work tried to make a reconstruction of a very orthodox
traditional and age old social institution of India that is caste.
In this work he describes a long journey from the traditional
textual interpretation of caste system from Sanskritic literature
base to its modern social reality with changing function.
According to Ghurye Sociology of India is not static, it
developed from the ancient India, travel through medieval
India and reaches modern India. Ghurye advocated that if an
institution cannot be studied in these three distinct phases we
cannot make a claim that we have made a study in totality; the
compartmentalized study is not complete. He states that this
type study on the basis of different phases of an institution
make a study fragmented and haphazard and hence Ghurye
viewed that an institution should be studied on the basis of
three things that are transition, transplantation and
transformation.
Caste is a major area of writing of Ghurye. He analyzed
caste in comparative, historical and Indological level. He is
different from his contemporaries, who are try to glorify or
contemn caste but he considers caste as a product of Indian
culture, changing with the passage of time and hence it is a
subject of sociological interest. Ghurye mainly studied caste as
diffusionist and historical perspective than Indological. The

work Caste and Race in India described the origin and features
of caste system in India, he agrees with Herbert Risely about
the description of origin of caste system, that caste is a product
of race that comes to India along with Aryans.
Ghurye considers caste system in mostly in terms of
Brahmanic domination. Caste has gone through the process of
fusion and fission in different ways in Indian History. History
says that caste system originated in Vedic period as a product
of race. Aryans migrated from Southern Europe and Northern
Asia, they distinguished themselves from non-Aryan in terms
of the colour of skin. Aryans are fair skinned people that
contrasted with the indigenous natives in India. But
subsequently different ethnic groups developed alliances with
each other groups and Hindu culture and values moved from
Aryan community to non- Aryan community. Aryans
possessed a particular principle of social ordering called Varna
Vyvastha, which was based on the four hierarchical divisions
of functions in society. They are engaged in religious and
educated functions and educational functions, military and
political functions, economic functions and menial functions.
The Aryans never introduced themselves as Superior race
(Brahmins) as against non-Brahmins. Aryan society itself
practiced different kinds of occupations which were allocated
to different individuals and families. On the basis of their
occupation caste names were allocated to different groups.
Therefore Aryan society had architects, peasants, Warriors,
artisans etc. their society was highly disciplined, organized and
progressive.

Ghurye’s work Caste and Race in India states that the

caste evolved in India with the advent of Aryans, as their racial
character was different from Indians. It is a matter of fact that
at the same time there were different racial categories present
in India prior to coming of the Aryans. India was not the
homeland of one racial group. Ghurye evaluates the Aryans’
advent in India added one more race to the already existing
ones. Caste was not a hierarchical exploitative system. Aryans
carried with them caste system which promoted discipline in
their life giving them specialization over particular occupation.
At that time no caste was superior or inferior and the
occupation change was also possible in society and hence
Aryans became highly specialized and indigenous. People
looked forward to Aryans for progress. Therefore they started
imbibing these elements into their life. Rules were taught the
virtues of Aryans by the Brahmins who glorified the Aryan
culture. These mobile saints spread the embodiment of caste to
non- Aryans.
Ghurye points out that the caste was considered as
central to organized from division of labor in Aryan society.
Aryans are the migrated and the indigenous communities
developed interpersonal relationships with the Aryans through
communication, warfare etc. The Aryans are disciplined in
nature that attracted the indigenous rulers and hence they
injected the elements of caste into their social life. In addition
to that priests, monasteries and travelers glorified the virtues of
Aryans caste system. Hence the elements of caste radiated
from northern India to other parts of the country.

Historical evidences shows that caste system derived in

Northern part of India then it spread into other parts of India.
Even though Ghurye highlights Aryans as a racial group come
in India like many other migrated racial group, but he
supported that the caste system originated in India with the
advent of Aryans. Ghurye analyzed Indian caste system only
of the basis of indigenous sources, through which he also
characterizes caste system that are given below
1. Segmental division of society: Under caste system society
is divided into several social groups called caste. The caste
is also divided into several subgroups like sub- caste. The
membership in caste is ascribed in character that is the
membership based on birth and flows from generation to
generation. The members of every division have fixed
status, role and occupation. There are also a set of moral
ethics, obligations and justification value behind these
roles. Hence each caste has its own traditional social
status, occupations, customs, rules and regulations.
2. Hierarchy: Hierarchy means the vertical arrangement of
things. According to Ghurye caste is hierarchical, in
hierarchy Brahmins are arranged at the top and Shudras
are at the bottom, Kshatriyas and Vaishyas are arranged
among the Brahmins and Shudras. This arrangement
mainly based on their social precedence. The hierarchy
also determines caste norms. The presence of hierarchy in
caste system is expressed or reflected through the division
of labor in society
3. Civil and religious disabilities: It reflects the rigidity of

caste system. In a caste society there is an unequal

distribution of disabilities and privileges among its
members. While the higher caste people enjoy all the
privilege the lower caste people suffer from various types
of disabilities. The untouchables are not allowed to freely
use the public roads, public wells and enter into temples
etc.
4. Lack of unrestricted choice of occupation: Traditional
occupation is the peculiarity of Indian caste system, which
is fixed by hereditary and generally the members cannot
select their occupation. The higher caste members
maintain their supremacy through occupation and do not
allow the other caste groups to join in the same
occupation.
5. Restriction on feeding and social intercourse: In caste
system there are several restrictions which are related to
food, drink and social inter-course. Rules are laid down
which govern the exchange food among other caste groups
and interaction between different castes. Foods are divided
into two on the basis of caste such as Pakka food and
Kachcha food. Pakka food is cooked with ghee, which is
eaten by Brahmins and the Kachcha food is cooked with
water, which is eaten by lower caste.
A higher caste man eats Pakka food from the house of
lower caste people but they never eat Kachcha food from
lower caste people.
6. Endogamy: It is closely related with the rules of marriage,

which is restriction on marriage. Caste endogamy is

strictly practiced by the members in caste, the people who
are married within his/her own caste. Caste exogamy is
not allowed in caste system.
Ghurye identified six characteristics of Indian caste
system through analyzing the Indological sources. All these
characteristics show that caste as an exploitative system. The
description about the origin of caste system explains it derived
as merely a division of labour, which is the disciplined
arrangement of caste. But in accordance with time changing
the system become exploitative.
Structural-Functional Approach
Modern sociological theory is very much influenced by
the functionalist analysis. The early functionalists have
borrowed heavily from Biological sciences and drew analogy
between society and an organism like human body. In this
regard, they argued that in order to know clearly about any
organ in the body such as brain, we need to understand its
relation to the other organs and its role in the maintenance of
the system as a whole. As the functionalist considers society as
a self-regulating system of interconnected parts with structured
social relationships and observable regularities, understanding
of any part of society requires an analysis of its relationship to
other parts. The functional approach in sociology is actually an
attempt to comprehend social phenomenon in terms of its
connection to the system as a whole. Radcliff brown and
Malinowski elaborated and codified functionalism as the basis
of anthropological and sociological thinking. Structural-

functional approach gives importance to the ordering and

patterning of the system parts. In biology structure simply
means relatively a stable arrangement of the parts in an orderly
manner which is functioned for the maintenance of system as a
whole, this is applied in social science also. Structural-
functional approach in sociology states that each and every
system has a clear structure which is arranged in an orderly
manner and it functions for the maintenance of system as a
whole. The main contributors of this approach in India are M
N Srinivas, S C Dube, McKim Marriot, I P Desai, D N
Majumdar etc. In next section briefly analyses the application
of structural-functional approach in the study of social
structure and mobility by M N Srinivas and the study of village
society by S C Dube.
Mysore Narasimhachar Srinivas
M N Srinivas was born in 1919 in Mysore in a Brahmin
family and he died in 1999 at Bangalore. He was the student of
G S Ghurye in Bombay University. He has contributed
significantly as a researcher as well as an institutional builder.
He must be given credit for setting up the department of
sociology at M S University and he has also contributed a lot
for the setting up of the Department of sociology in Delhi
University. He was introduced the tradition of macro-
sociological generalization on micro-anthropological insight
and of giving a sociological sweep and perspective to
anthropological investigation of small scale communities. He
achieved his D.phil from Oxford University where Radcliff
Brown was his Professor; his structuralist approach was highly

influence Srinivas. He is credited to have initiated a new line

of structural-functional analysis in Sociological and
Anthropological research in India. Srinivas did not relied on
Western textbooks or indigenous ancient texts to know about
the countrymen rather he tried to know from the direct
observation that is field view. He was not support the book
view because of his belief is the book view provides a distorted
picture about the phenomena. Intensive field work or field
view provides a clear picture about the situations. He has
focused on many concepts in Indian society like religion,
culture, village community and social change. By applying
structural-functional approach he has studied Indian society as
a totality. He wrote many intellectual works which are highly
influenced the development of sociology in India those works
are mentioned below:
Religion and society among the Coorgs in South India (1952)
Social change in Modern India (1966)
Marriage and family in Mysore (1942) The remembered
Village (1976)
Caste in Modern India (1962)
Besides the above mentioned books, Srinivas wrote
many other essays. His important work Religion and society
among Coorgs in South India is based on the intensive field
work where Srinivas has focused on social and religious lives
of Coorgs. By explaining the interaction in ritual context of
different castes of the Coorgs he describes the concept of
functional unity. In that work he wrote about the concept of

Brahmanization then he changed it as sanskritisation. Social

change in Modern India is the prominent book of Srinivas
which mainly discusses the concept of social change on the
basis of mobility in caste system, which expresses the
structural transformation in society. The Remembered Village
is another work which has written about the structure of caste
system in Rampura village. He discusses caste system as an
occupational classification while doing so, he sees its link with
agriculture. He sees each caste is a homogeneous group which
is linked with other castes leading to an organic integration of
each caste with others they are related with each other in a
functional perspective. He has also coined the concept
dominant caste in that work. The concept dominant caste has
been used to study the power relation at the village level.
M N Srinivas an Indian sociologist who produced
various scholarly works, Religion and society among the
Coorgs of South India was one among them, it is a masterly
ethnographic account and yet it is not the product of
participant observation which calls for intensive study of a
small society for two to three years. Srinivas like other
functionalists viewed Indian society as a system and analyzed
it in terms of the pattern of social relationships and social
institutions and how their functions contribute to sustenance of
the society. He examined and interpreted social phenomena
like caste, family, religion etc. in their functional terms within
a larger context of Indian society. Srinivas applied the
approach structural-functional in his work entitled as Religion
and Society among the Coorgs of South India, the book has

shown the complex inter-relationship of ritual and social

solidarity as a part of the social system and discussed the
crucial notions of purity and pollution as a basis for the
organization of social life. Besides these, he applied the
approach in the themes that are given below:
1. Caste system, the study of village and religion.
2. Social change.
1. The caste system, the study of village and Religion
For Srinivas caste is a segmentry system with each
caste being divided into a number of sub-caste, which have
certain characteristics, that are given below:
i. Sub-caste are the unit of endogamy
ii. Whose members follow a common occupation
iii. Sub-castes are the unit of social and ritual life
iv. Whose members share a common culture
v. Whose members are governed by the same authoritative
body like the Panchayaths.
Besides these characteristics of sub-castes, there are
certain other attributes are important, which are the
characteristics of castes. These characteristics are given below:
a) Hierarchy: It is the core of caste system. It refers to the
arrangement of hereditary group in a rank order. The
Brahmins are arranged on the top of hierarchy and the
untouchables are arranged on the bottom of hierarchy, this
arrangement on the basis of social status. Kshatriyas and

Vaishyas are arranged in the middle of the hierarchy

among Brahmins and untouchables. The hierarchy is
clearest in the terms of rank. The middle range of the
hierarchy is flexible.
b) Occupational difference: Classification of caste is mainly
a functional divisioning. Each caste has an occupation
which is traditionally transformed from one generation to
another. These occupations are placed in a hierarchy of
high and low.
c) Restriction on commensality, dress, speech and customs:
It is the peculiarity of caste system. There is some
restriction on common dining and food habits. The people
in different caste groups wear different types of dress and
they are also used separate language for communication,
customs are different on the basis of caste differentiation.
d) Pollution: It is the essence of caste system. The purified
caste keep a distance from the polluted caste, the distance
between castes is maintained by the principle of pollution.
Any contact with the polluted, whether an object or being,
renders a caste impure and demands that the caste or its
member undergo purification rituals.
e) Caste Panchayath and Assemblies: Every caste is subject
to the control of an order maintaining body or a
Panchayath. The Panchayath may be formed by elderly of
each caste. Further every caste is also answerable to the
authority of its caste assembly, which may extend beyond
village boundaries.

These are the characteristics of caste system in India as

specified by M N Srinivas, which provide an idea about the
structure of caste and village society. Caste is Indian
phenomenon and it provides guidelines for behaviour and
living. In accordance with time changed the caste system
became an exploitative system, which provided a disciplined
manner for life of rural people.
The Remembered Village (1976) is an outstanding
work of M N Srinivas, which explained the Rampur village in
Mysore. He identified the caste in village community. He
considered the village as the microcosm of Indian society and
civilization. According to him the identity of Indian tradition is
found in caste, village and religion. His conceptualization of
tradition is in no sense secular but rather at par with the
Hindutva notion of Indian traditions. At this point he suggested
that the caste system was resilient, adapting itself to new
changes those being inaugurated by economy and polity.
Particularly when examining the mobility in modern India, he
highlighted the continuous adaptive character of the caste
system and its ability to adjust to the modern process of change
and presented two paths of mobility-Sanskritisation for those
within Hindu fold and Westernization for those outside it.
Srinivas divides the village population by caste and by
occupation and then connects caste to occupation. Thus he
shows the organic interaction of each caste with each other in a
functional way. The caste is best understood by focusing not
only on the middle ranks but also in the context of the internal
ranking of each jati with the other. This type of ambiguity in

rank and status allows for mobility of groups. Dominant caste

is another term referred in his study of Remembered Village.
He defined dominant caste on the basis of six attributes that are
given below:
1) Sizeable amount of arable land
2) Strength of numbers
3) High place in local hierarchy
4) Western education
5) Jobs in the administration
6) Urban sources of income
Of the above mentioned attributes, the following three
are most important in determining the dominant status of a
caste: (1) Numerical strength (2) economic power through
ownership of land (3) political power. Accordingly, a
dominant caste is any caste which has all the three mentioned
attributes in a village and hence the ritual ranking of a caste no
longer remains the major basis of its position in the social
hierarchy. Even if a caste was considered low in the social
hierarchy due to its ritual ranking, it could still become the
dominant ruling caste in a village if it were numerically large,
owned land and had political power over village matters. M N
Srinivas had studied Rampura village in Mysore, there
peasants are the dominant caste even though they have low
ranking in ritual hierarchy. Their numerical strength was high,
owned land and had political influence on the village affairs.
2. Social Change
Social change is a prominent theme of Sociologists as

well as Anthropologists. M N Srinivas concentrates on social

change, his idea of social change mainly based on social
mobility like Brahmanization, Sanskritisation, westernization
and secularization.
 Brahmanization: Religion and Society among the Coorgs
of South India (1952) is the major book of Srinivas, which
is firstly mentioned the concept of Brahmanization, which
means the process of imitation of the life ways and rituals
of Brahmins by low caste Hindus. The concept was used
as explanatory device to interpret the changes as he
observed in life ways and ritual practices of the lower
castes that he observed through the intensive field work.
 Sanskritisation: It is a term introduced by M N Srinivas in
his work entitled as Social Change in Modern India
(1966). The term sanskritisation introduced after the
coming of the term Brahmanization, that term was very
limited in its scope. The people in lower caste not only
imitate the life style of Brahmins but also imitate the life
style of other twice born communities like Kshatriya and
Vaishyas thus Srinivas used the term sanskritisation for
imitation of the life style of the people arranged on the top
of hierarchy. He defined sanskritisation as a process
through which the low caste, tribe or other groups takes
over the customs, rituals believes, ideology and style of
living of a high and in particular, a twice born caste. After
the imitation of the life style of higher caste people, the
emulated people claim the higher caste status.
Sanskritisation generally a social mobility, but it produced

change in social structure.

 Westernization: It is the concept introduced by M N
Srinivas to denote the factors of change coming from
outside of India. He firstly applied the concept
westernization in an essay entitled as “A note on
Sanskritisation and Westernization”, the essay included in
his book, Caste in Modern India (1962). According to
Srinivas westernization is the change brought about in
Indian society and culture as a result of over 150 years of
British rule and the term subsumes changes occurring at
different levels-technology, institutions, ideology and
values.”
 Secularization: Secularization in India is the process of
treating all the religion in India as equal and neutral.
Srinivas analyzed how the social changes influence the
views on religion, caste and village, and then he analyzed
secularization as the result of social change
westernization. Srinivas explained the term secularization
as the after effect of westernization. Although the process
of secularization was set in motion as part of
westernization it became more pronounced and broad
based after independence and with the declaration of India
as a secular state. The concept of secularization has two
dimensions like desacralization of society and
rationalization of thought and action.
In the work of Social Change in Modern India (1966),
Srinivas gives a comprehensive view of qualitative changes
taking place in the nature of Indian society by using the three

theoretical concepts of Sanskritisation, Westernization and

Secularization. Each concept signifies a system of meaning as
well as a process of transformation affecting not merely social
consciousness but also culture and social structure. Caste and
religion are the major topics of analysis of Srinivas, he
analyzed how religion plays an important role to formulate
Indian society. Srinivas doesn’t concentrate on the two stage
structural transformation, that of transition from pre-modern to
modern. Rather, he discusses only one structure that of the
caste system which seems to encompass both stages.
Syama Charan Dube
S C Dube was born in 1922 at Narsinghpur in Madhya
Pradesh and died in 1996. He obtained his MA from Nagpur
University in Political Science. He started his career as a
teacher in Bishop College in Nagpur. Later he joined Osmania
University, and then he quit from there and joined as Deputy
Director of Anthropological Survey of India in Nagpur. He
was also the Director at the Indian Institute of Advanced
Studies, Shimla. The major themes of work of S C Dube were
tribe, modernization, community development, management of
change and tradition. He conducted a study of the tribe namely
Kamar in Madhya Pradesh. His work Indian Village is the first
full length account of village social structure where he deals
with the total study of Shamirpet in the region of Telegana of
Andhra Pradesh. He wrote many works related with tribe,
Indian village, tradition, modernization, change etc. His works
are multidisciplinary in nature. Certain important works are
mentioned here;

India’s Changing Village (1958)

The Kamar (1951)
Indian Village (1955)
Institution Building for community Development (1968)
Contemporary India and its Modernization (1974)
In Indian Village Dube has made important
contribution in understanding the Indian society with the help
of structural-functional perspective. Village society is the main
theme of that work, he mainly focused on the changing nature
of Indian villages and he concluded that Indian village is
changing. He is not believed that villages are not independent
and completely autonomous but it is semi-autonomous. For
him village is just one unit in a wider social system and is a
part of an organized political society. According to Dube
village society is organized through the combination of various
units like caste, religious groups or a tribe. He studied village
community with special reference to Shamirpet village in
Madhyapradesh near Hyderabad. He collected data from
Shamirpet through field work from historical, geographical,
political and sociological perspective on different aspects of
social, economic and religious practices of village in India,
which reflected an integrated picture of the village. His studies
mainly concentrate on the social structure, economic structure
and ritual structure, the web of family ties and level of living.
By studying the social structure, he has identified six factors
that contributed towards the status differentiation in the village
community of Shamirpet: religion and caste, land ownership,

wealth, position in government service and village

organization, age and distinctive personality traits. He also
emphasizes on the phenomena like caste, inter-caste and inter-
village organization. In addition, he highlights the village
organizations like caste Panchayath of lower or menial castes
worked as a union to secure their employment and strengthen
their bargaining power viz. a viz. the land owning dominant
castes. He reveals through his studies the fact that in India the
single village is not autonomous and independent; a village is
always a single unit in wider social system, so the village
structures organize village society and the village society
working as a unit of function of the wider social system. Caste
is a unit of village society; it is the groups on the basis of
functional specialization, all the castes are interdependent and
the occupational mobility was very low in caste. The economic
system in village was mostly caste based, but its role not
confined in economic system, it regulates the interrelationship,
inter-dining, etc. and it became the real structure of Indian
village that directs the social relationship in villages. The inter-
caste relations were strong in village society, the persons
belonging to different castes are united by common values and
obligations. Dube highlights the inter-village and inter-caste
organizations like the various types of religious services and
festivals in village society such as the family ceremonies,
village familial and communal festivals and the Muslims and
Hindus interaction with each other during festivals. Economic
structure is a basic structure constitutes the social structure.
The economic system is mainly caste based, the occupation
traditionally fixed by birth in a specific caste group. Besides

these hereditary occupations, people in all sections engaged in

poultry. Agriculture, cattle rearing, hunting, fishing etc. are
other occupations of people in village society.
The level of living of the people in village is
determined on the basis of status differentiation in the
community, standard of living, division of labour in terms of
work and diet. Dube recognized six factors contribute in terms
of status differentiation: religion and caste, land ownership,
wealth, age, distinctive personality factors and position in
government service and in village organization. Village has a
ritual structure constituted by folklore, myths, religious
teaching etc.
Everything is constituted by a structure, these
structures have parts, these parts fulfill its functions for the
maintenance of system as a whole. M N Srinivas applied this
approach in his analysis of social structure and social mobility.
His concept of social structure is on the basis of caste
structure. He concluded that all the changes in society are
reflected through the transformations in caste structure. He
analyzes the social change in terms of social mobility. Dube
applied structural-functional approach in his study of village
society, each and every village has a structure but it is not self-
sufficient, it is a unit in system as a whole.

MODULE 3
APPROACHES TO THE STUDY OF
INDIAN SOCIETY-II
Approaches are the theoretical framework which

provides certain ideas to perceive the phenomena. Approaches
are the inevitable aspects of every subjects, it is mainly the
application of various theories in the empirical context. The
third module discusses the various approaches like Cultural,
Dialectical and Subaltern which are used in sociology to make
sense about our living society. Cultural approach mainly
analyzed the society on the basis of cultural evolution or
civilization and dialectical approach following a conflictual
line of analysis. Subaltern perspective is the important and
mostly discussed approach in present day society; it is a way of
looking society into downward. The approaches provide an
outlook about the application of theories in empirical society.
Cultural Approach
Cultural approach is a prominent approach used by
Indian sociologists to know about Indian society on the basis
of culture and cultural changes. This approach is also known as
civilizational perspective. Culture and civilization are the two
terms interchangeably used to denote the idea of culture. The
concept civilization has wider meaning in sociology such as
culture, territorial expansion of particular culture and cultural
continuity at particular period over a long period of time. Thus
culture and civilization are related concepts. The civilizational

approach to Indian society and culture attempts to explore and

analyze the growth and development of society from its
original core to the modern form through assimilation or
acculturation. It tries to explain the Indian society as a
civilizational whole having its parts or divisions interlinked
and combined through cultural continuity, mixtures or
unifications. The term civilization used to denote a highly
complex culture as contrasted with relatively simple culture.
The thinkers of civilizational approach use the term
civilization to refer to a historical reality that has developed
and taken shape over time. In civilizing process normally
involves gradual and steady changes in the structure and
culture of a society through development of plural and
complex institutions, beliefs and practices. In other words from
the perspective of civilizational approach, a civilization has a
valued past while its present reflects complexities of culture
and structure. Hence the followers of this approach strive to
analyze a social system, a nation from a historical-
civilizational frame and attempt to delve deep into the
veracities of its social institutions, practices and relations from
both textual and field point of view.
The civilizational approach was first designed by
Robert Redfield, an American Cultural Anthropologist, who
applied this approach in his study of the Mexican Village
Community that outlined an ideal-typical construct of folk
society. In this work Redfield explains about the transition of
folk or pre-industrialized, or pre-literate society to urban or
industrialized society. He suggested that the spread of urban

based civilization transforms the folk societies and individual

settlements can be placed along an evolutionary folk-urban
continuum. According to him folk societies are small, isolated,
non-literate and socially homogeneous. He defined village as a
little community. As opposed to this the urban societies are
characterized by the converse traits like loss of isolation,
heterogeneity, social disorganization, secularization and
individuality. Milton Singer and McKim Marriot are the other
thinkers applied this approach in their studies. Following
Redfield, Singer and Marriot constructed the conceptual
framework of Little and Great traditions of Indian Village.
Yogendra Singh argues that the basic ideas in this approach as
civilization and social organization of the traditions. It is based
on evolutionary view that civilization or of structure of
tradition grows into two stages like first through orthogenetic
or indigenous evolution and second through heterogenetic
encounters or contact with other cultures or contacts, that is the
contacts from outside of India. The social structure of these
two civilizations are operated at two levels like the first that of
the folk or unlettered peasants, the cultural processes
comprised them as little tradition and the second that of the
elite or reflective few, they comprised Great tradition. There is
a constant interaction between the two levels of traditions.
Unity of civilization is maintained by its cultural structure that
perpetuates the unity of world-view through cultural
performances and their products. These cultural performances
are institutionalized around the social structure of both Little
and Great traditions. Changes in the cultural system follow
through the interaction between the two traditions, though the

pattern of change is generally from the orthogenetic to

heterogenetic forms of differentiation or change in the cultural
structure of change. Besides these sociologists, Surajith Sinha
and N K Bose two other thinkers applied this approach for the
study of Indian society, their contributions to cultural approach
are discussed here.
Surajith Chandra Sinha
Surajit Sinha was a noted Cultural Anthropologist from
Bengal. He applied the civilizational approach in evolutionary
model of tribe-caste-peasant-caste continuum. He was greatly
influenced by Redfield, Singer and Bose in exploring the
nature of Indian society and its social organization. Sinha had
begun his analysis of the genesis and functioning of indigenous
civilization by focusing on the notion of ‘great tradition’ and
‘little tradition’. These traditions are argued to be in constant
interaction with each other. He had attempted to develop his
‘Civilizational approach’ by concentrating on the socio-
cultural tradition of little communities forming the so-called
tribal belt of peninsular India, covering the hills, plateaus and
the plains of Bombay, Madhya Pradesh, Hyderabad, Orissa,
Southern Bihar and West Bengal, in relation to the study of
Indian civilization. The generalized characteristics of the
Hindu peasant communities are derived partly from Sinha’s
general impression of Hindu village communities in West
Bengal, Bihar and Orissa, and also from other secondary
sources.
It should be noted here that research into the tribal life
in India has time and again established that the boundary

between tribe and caste is more or less fluid making it possible

for the former to regularly get absorbed into the Jati fold.
These claims have given rise to numerous theoretical
frameworks to explain the various ways in which tribes are
transformed into castes. Surajith Sinha provided the Rajput or
Kshatriya model to understand such transformation. He
credited the absorption of tribes into Hindu caste system to the
process of state formation that accompanied the establishment
of tribal dynasties in many parts of peninsular India during the
ancient and medieval periods. While most of these dynasties,
such as Gonds and the Bhumij, rose into prominence from the
ranks of the tribal aristocracy, some like Ahom kingdom in
Assam were established by foreign invaders. Many of these
dynasties also functioned as centers of Brahminic Hinduism, a
legacy they acquired from the practice of conferring land
grants on Brahmin. To accelerate the growth of the economy
and meet cost of administration, many chiefs encouraged
Brahmins and other upper castes to settle in their kingdom so
that the state benefits from their thrifty ways, academic
experience and vast knowledge of agriculture. To reward the
benefactor(s) for their generosity, the learned Brahmins not
only undertook to educate the masses, but also came up with
elaborate genealogies that linked the chief’s ancestry to
mythological Hindu figures. The values and norms of the
Hinduism were transmitted to the tribal people in the process.
While this practice earned the tribal rulers the prestigious
status of Kshatriya, it also served to reproduce the hierarchical
structure of caste in the relatively egalitarian tribal society.
Aiding the process were the vast contingent of traders, money

lenders and military mercenaries who came in search of land

and fortune, and Hindu peasant and artisan castes that
accompanied the Brahmins as part of the labour process. The
Bhumij-Hindu interactions have been the subject matter of a
detailed study by Sinha (since 1950), who examined the tribe-
caste interactions in the series of his papers and proposed
several useful concepts like ‘tribe-caste- peasant continua’,
‘tribe-peasant continuum’ as well as ‘Bhumij-Kshatriya’ and
‘tribe- Rajput continuum’. Sinha, however, noted clearly that
these are ‘ideal sets of continua’ and the reality may differ in
practice depending upon the differential movement of criteria
used to define the continua within the proximal range. Yet,
these concepts provide the model to understand the process of
social transformation in the whole of middle India. It should be
noted here that the process of assimilation has been a part and
parcel of the Indian tribal culture for several centuries. Even
our colonial rulers, who labeled certain ethnic groups as
‘tribe’, later failed to explain where the tribe ended and caste
began when Census operations were undertaken. Like the
Bhumij of Madhya Pradesh, the Cheros, Kharwars and
Parahiyas of Bihar have been greatly influenced by the
Kshatriya model of Hinduisization and they have
‘Sanskritized’ their life style to brand themselves as Kshatriya.
Sinha’s tribe-caste- peasant continuum model is a continuation
of such efforts to explain the gradual assimilation of tribes into
Hindu peasantry. The ‘tribe-Rajput continuum’ has been
suggested in the light of historical and ethnographic studies of
the Bhumij. Sinha had argued that though the actual process of
formation of a state had taken varied courses in different

circumstances, the Bhumij Raj of Birbhum like the Raj Gond

Raj of Gondwana, Munda Raj of Chotanagpur appear to have
emerged mainly through an internal development of tribal
base.
Even though the picture of general merging of ‘the
tribes’ with the caste system became evident in several
anthropological studies. Several Anthropological studies
approached the subject in terms of an arbitrary cluster of traits
without trying to define them as two ideal socio- cultural
‘systems’. Hence, Sinha began his analysis by noting the
following major differences between the ideal typical notions
of caste and tribe.
First, a major portion of tribal habitat of central India is
hilly and forest. Tribal villages are generally found in areas
away from the alluvial plants close to rivers. By contrast, a
large portion of Hindu peasant villages are in deforested
plateaus or plaints. Many of these villages are crowded in the
river plains. Second, the subsistence economy of the tribes is
based on hunting, collecting, and fishing, or a combination of
hunting and collecting with shifting cultivation. Even the so-
called plough using agricultural tribes have the tradition of
having subsisted mainly by means of shifting cultivation in the
past. By contrast, the Hindu peasantry practices intensive
agriculture with the help of plough drawn by bullocks or
buffaloes. Along with them, there are full time specialists like
gold smith, weavers, metal workers, etc. Beyond a limited
degree of local self-sufficiency, the village community is tied
to a countrywide network of markets, ultimately related to

commercial towns. Third, at the level of social structure, the

largest significant reference group is the tribe or a segment of
it, the sub-tribe. A tribe is segmented into exogamous totemic
clans, frequently with territorial cohesion and strong corporate
identity. There is very little specialization of social roles and
secular and religious leadership are combined in one person.
Similarly, there is very little rigid stratification. But the Hindu
peasant society maintains its complexly stratified caste
divisions. Rules of both endogamy and exogamy control the
kinship and marriage customs of peasants. Caste occupations
are mostly hereditary and Jajmani system makes people
belonging to different patron and the client castes
interdependent. Secular and religious leadership are clearly
demarcated. Fourth, the supernaturalism of the tribes involves
one sun god and a lower hierarchy of gods. Gods are
conceived as powerful beings and they are classified into two
classes: benevolent and malevolent. Supernatural rites are
explicitly directed towards happiness and security in the world.
There is no concept of ‘heaven’ or ‘hell’. No idol or temple in
well defined form is found. Animal sacrifice is an essential
part of rituals, and magic and witchcraft predominate. The
world view of the tribes conceives a good life as a life with
ample scope for indulgence in pleasure, while maintaining
social obligations to corporate group/groups. The
supernaturalism of the Hindu peasantry, however, is a contrast
of monotheism, pantheism and polytheism. Apart from the
power connotation of the deities, there is an emergent overtone
of gods standing for ethical quality, dharma, rewarding moral
behaviour and punishing sinful or immoral behaviour. The

concepts of ‘heaven’ and ‘hell’ consequently are very

important. Finally, both temples and idolatry are very
important. As compared to the tribes, the level of aspirations of
the peasants is higher. Even within the bounds of indigenous
civilization, the peasant’s world-view is affected by ideas
coming from the elites of the city. A desire for more land and
wealth, more power and status hit the peasant’s mind.
The foregoing differences, however, do not make the
two cultural systems completely different. Rather, as Sinha
argued, there are significant elements of continuity between
non-Hindu tribes and Hindu peasant socio-economic systems.
Thus, in both systems there is emphasis on local self-
sufficiency, with barter as an important element of trade,
corporate kinship reference in economy, and symbiotic
relationship with ethnic groups. Again, Caste and tribe have
almost identical structural features as social units, with a belief
in common descent and endogamy, exogamous clan
segmented into functional lineages, a tempered classification
of kinship terminology, stress on age and generation in the
kinship system, importance of village as a territorial unit and
finally democracy in leadership. At the ideological level, belief
in a Supreme Being, ancestral spirits, sprits of the hills and
waters, belief in reincarnation, corporate social reference in
religion and animal sacrifice are commonly observed.
Nirmal Kumar Bose
N K Bose an Indian Anthropologist born in Durgapur
Upazila at Bengal now in Bangladesh. He applied
civilizational approach through tribe-Hindu continuum model,

which is presented through the study of Juang tribe and tribes

in Chotanagpur. Before analyzing this study, we understand
the structure of Hindu society. For pictorizing the structure of
Hindu society he analyzed it with the help of the realm of
Indology. He read the Ancient texts like the epics and Smritis,
including the Buddhist texts. He summarized as Hindu society
has been built up over the ages by the integration of various
communities. The attempt to become a part of the Hindu
society by purification of traditional customs/rituals was not
restricted among the Mundas or Oraons only; it was rather a
general process seen among many caste groups and our epics
like Ramayana and Mahabharata borne testimony to these
experiences. Bose quoted a story from Ramayana to prove that
lower castes enjoyed the right to adopt the practices of twice-
born. Similarly, from Mahabharata we get ample evidence of
the incorporation of various communities into the Varna
system. Bose concluded on the basis of the reading of ancient
texts chaturvarna system was a particular method to divide
various kinds of phenomena including the human society into
four distinct hierarchical classes. He found in them the
continual attempt to explain the ranks occupied by particular
communities according to origin and functions. Analysis of the
epics and Smritis also led him to discover the ‘tendency in
each lower order caste to imitate the rites and customs of the
higher order castes’. He also showed how new sub-castes had
emerged within the same caste through changes in social
custom or occupational techniques. Bose rejected the myth of
divine origin, reincarnation and notion of purity and pollution
in explaining the caste system. He rather supported the

functionalist view that due to the positive ‘functions’ of

occupational and cultural security provided particularly to low
caste people by the non-competitive, hereditary, vocation-
based productive organization, the caste system became stable
in traditional India. Sociologists like Srinivas, Ghurye etc.
provided a picture of a complex but integrated Hindu society
with its intricacies being determined by a distinct pattern of
‘unity within diversity’ Bose also supported this view. Bose,
however, did not think that the ideal of cooperation and inter-
dependence in the structure of relatively self-sufficient Indian
society was an example of socialism or ‘primitive
communism’. Because there was no reason for him to believe
that Brahminical society was completely egalitarian.
Contrarily, due to the evil design of the Brahmins, the lower
caste people were deprived of the opportunities of higher
learning and the practice of religious sacrifice. In spite of such
grave causes for opposition or revolt, the Hindu society
remained united. The common people did not protest against
the social supremacy of the Brahmins and consequent
inequalities between different Jatis and between different
Varna. This was due to the fact that they could also
simultaneously enjoy the basic material securities and observe
without any hindrance their family, caste and local customs.
As the economically better off Brahmnically-governed Aryan
society recognized the rights of people to their own customs
and took up the responsibility to protect them from starvation,
the incoming communities freely accepted the positions
assigned to them in Hindu society.

The Brahmins, therefore, were also tolerant to evolve a

positive design to ensure cooperation and mutual trust. Bose
affirmed that the two fundamental principles, namely a)
opportunities of self-expression, and b) the right of a family or
caste to its particular occupation, united the people together by
mutual bonds and the rise and fall of kingdoms or even famine,
revolt and epidemics could not destroy this foundation of
Hindu social organization. Because of this vitality, ‘Indian
culture, in spite of its many internal weaknesses, has been able
to remain alive in the shelter of Indian social institutions and
unlike many historically famous civilizations; it has not
altogether lost the possibility of revival and a new awakening’.
The continuity of the Varna system could not even be thwarted
by the efforts of persons like Nanak, Chaitanya or Rammohan
when they sought to replace discrimination by social equality.
People have rather transformed these groups into castes within
the wider Hindu society. Bose doesn’t state that the evil
practices of caste system as a cause for attract the low caste
people the Islam Religion. But he also states that the converted
low caste to Islam followed their formerly followed traditional
occupation and customs so he concluded that low caste people
converted to Islam due to other causes than the evil practices
of caste system. Bose also discovered an ecological wisdom at
the root of the caste system. And this wisdom was the idea that
‘man is subservient to society’. The Blacksmith, Potter,
Washer men, Barber, Brahmin or Astrologer makes his living
by serving society in the prescribed way. They attend to
society and society attends to them. Rights and obligations are
inextricably tied. The village was in many ways the basic unit

of economic organization in the traditional system and so long

as the division of labour within the Varna system remained
substantially the same, the larger society continued to retain
the same basic design. It was only after the advent of the
British that the foundation of this arrangement was shaken and
disrupted.
He applied civilizational approach tribe-Hindu
Continuum, which is presented through the study of Juang
tribe and tribes in Chotanagpur. For that he analyzed the data
and summarized it as to show the two characteristics of tribal
communities first is to show the nature of tribal communities
in India and second is their relationship with the wider
societies. The evolutionary growth of the tribal communities is
different, because the evolutionary growth occurring on the
basis of the intensity of the relationship between the tribal
communities and the wider society. The relationship of the
tribal communities with wider society is different, certain
communities keep a close relation with wider society, and
there the evolutionary growth is high. Bose put forward two
central factors which determine the evolutionary growth of
tribal communities one is a level of technological development
to which a community is exposed and second is the degree of
geographical and social isolation of tribal communities. He
believed that the best way to classify the tribes in India was not
language, race or religion but by the mode of livelihood.
The account of some of the remote hilly tribes of
Orissa – the Juangs, the Savaras and the Pauri Bhuiyas –
shows that their mode of livelihood was based on shifting

cultivation and they maintained least proximity with the

dominant Brahminical civilization. Even though these remote
tribal communities maintained a degree of geographical and
social isolation and consequently could not develop their level
of technology, they too lived for centuries under the shadow of
Hindu civilization. Using his knowledge of Vaishnava
literature and his familiarity with the distribution of temples,
Bose claimed that the tribal and non-tribal communities have
lived in mutual awareness of each other superior technological
base, and was much larger in scale and more complex in
organization as compared to the tribal mode of social
organization. The tribes increasingly came in contact with the
advanced people of the plain and got impressed by the superior
technological base of the latter as their simple technology was
unable to cope with the pressure of population on the land.
Bose stressed on the higher technical and economic efficiency
of the Brahmanical civilization rather than its superior political
power or religious strength for attracting the attention of the
trial communities to it. The Rights given to all communities
within the Hindu social order to practice their distinctive
customs and occupations even within a hierarchical structure
was added attraction. Bose wanted to stress on such non-
economic consideration for explaining the absorption of tribal
groups into the Hindu fold. In other words, any understanding
of the Hindu society as a whole must take into account not
only its level of technology but also the design by which
economic relations are organized. As the ‘Sanskritic’ and ‘non-
Sanskritic’ elements are equally traced among the rituals of
Juangs or the Savaras, Bose raised the question whether these

communities should or should not be regarded as Hindus.

Popularly, they are categorized as ‘non-Aryans’ falling broadly
within the Hindu fold. Thus, the Juangs had begun
worshipping a Hindu Goddess, although in a typically tribal
way. The influence of Brahminical culture can also be noticed
in many features of ceremonies in the Juang village.
These are: bathing, fasting, use of turmeric, incense and sun-
dried rice, the innovation of terms like Lakshidevata,
Rishipatni, etc. On the contrary, the absence of a separate
category of priests and of formalised prayers, the cock
sacrifice, the worship of Burambura, Buramburi, the existence
of a separate language, marriage and funeral customs, beef
eating etc., bear witness to an autonomous, non-Hindu folk
culture. One should therefore make a broad distinction
between Hindu society proper with its complex caste structure
and the marginally situated tribal communities like the Juangs
and Savaras who hardly maintained such division of labour.
Quite logistically, for Bose, these marginally placed
communities were not just ‘backward Hindus. Bose did not
favour any kind of complete and forceful integration of the
tribes with the non-tribes, as he knew that even the ‘developed’
groups like Munda or Oraons did not completely merge their
identity. He rather recognized the co-existence and
interpenetration of the two modes of social organization and
did not believe that the dominant Hindu or Brahminical mode
would subsume completely the folk or the local tribal culture.
The significance of such an analysis lies in its ability to explain
the rise and growth of tribal identity (and similar other ethnic

and local identities) in later part of 19th century. Bose also

dealt with the two main tribes of Chota Nagpur, namely
Munda and Oraons. These tribes were not only larger in size;
they also represented a higher level of technological
development in association with a more complex pattern of
village organization. Bose noticed that the Munda language is
not a part of the Aryan family of languages; yet as a result of
long association, many Hindi words have been incorporated
into it in a slightly modified form. Mundas have also accepted
the superior system of productive organization of the
Brahminical society developed as a result of close association
among different castes. The Brahminical influence is greater in
the vicinity of the Manbhum district. Like Juangs, the Mundas
too apply turmeric, exchange vermilion (by bride & groom)
and prescribe fasting and bathing during religious ceremonies.
Among the Mundas resident in the Panch-Parganas some
have adopted the Vaishnava faith. On the whole, they began to
regard themselves as a peasant caste and for fear of losing
caste, they either kept their hands off the trades of Oil presser,
Carpenter, Blacksmith or amended the work process. They
learnt to sow cotton and make yarn with a spinning wheel; they
gave up their plank press and adopted the more elaborate oil
press of the Kolus. But as the Kolus were rated low in Hindu
society, the Mundas avoided the bullocks to carry out the work
and involved their own womenfolk.
As a corollary, caste like distinctions/gradations came
to be established in Munda society. For instance, the Munda
cultivators begun to regard themselves as equal to the other

cultivating castes, and to regard the practitioners of many of

the other crafts and occupations as being their inferiors.
Similarly, the Munda king acquired the status of Kshatriyas.
And the ‘pure Mundas’ of the Panch-Parganas, those who
have modified their customs following the Brahminical
influence, called the beef eating Mundas as ‘Mundari’ or
‘Uram-Munda’. The purified Mundas also believed that they
belong to Sandil clan and the sage Sandilya was their ancestor.
In this way, the Kol speaking Mundas became a part of the
Hindu society for all practical purposes even though in the
matter of land rights or social arrangements they differed
considerably from the Hindu castes.
Dialectical Approach
It is an approach or perspective used to study the
society in a class angle. The thinkers followed this approach
believed that the emergence of Indian society and its unique
institutions from the interference of material phenomena that
determines everything else. The material mode of production
forms the basic structure of any society and the socio- cultural
domain of social relationships and institutions constitute the
superstructure. This approach is also known as Marxian
approach. Marxists believe that society is held together by
bonds of production. The nature of interaction of people with
natural surroundings depends on the techniques of production.
The surplus depends on the means of production and the
distribution of surplus among various members is a matter for
the relations of production. D D Kosambi, P C Joshi, R K
Mukherjee, D P Mukherjee and A R Desai etc are the main

thinkers used dialectical approach to analyze Indian Society. In

this syllabus mainly concentrate two thinkers’ view about the
dialectical approach which are given below:
Durjathi Prasad Mukherjee
D P Mukherjee popularly called as D P was one of the
founding fathers of sociology in India. He was born 1894 in
West Bengal in a middle class Bengali family that had a fairly
long tradition of intellectual pursuits. DP began his career at
Bangabasi College in Calcutta. In 1922 he joined the newly
founded Lucknow University as a lecturer in Economics and
Sociology. DP was an outstanding Indian whose versatile
interests have made landmarks not only in the field of
Sociology but also in Economics, literature, music and art. Yet,
sociology has been benefited most from his erudite
contributions. DP, besides being a scholar, was an extremely
cultured and sensitive person. His personality was remarkable
for its power in influencing and moulding the young people
who came in touch with him. He was a Marxist but preferred
to call him a Marxiologist, i.e., a social scientist of Marxism.
He analyses Indian society from Marxian perspective of
dialectical materialism. DP was a pioneer in the field of
sociology of culture .He resisted any attempt at the
compartmentalization of knowledge in social science. He was
deeply interested in understanding the nature and meaning of
Indian social reality rooted in the Indian tradition. He was
equally interested in finding out the ways of how to change it
for promoting welfare of the common people by adapting the
forces of modernity to the specificity of Indian tradition.

DP was a versatile scholar. His early publications

include: Basic Concepts in Sociology (1932) and Personality
and the Social Sciences (1924). Some of the other publications
are: Modern Indian Culture (1942, revised enlarged edition in
1948), Problems of Indian Youth (1942), and Views and
Counterviews (1946). Modern Indian Culture (1942) and
Diversities (1958) are known as his best works. His
versatilities can be seen from his other contributions such as
Tagore: A Study (1943), On Indian History: A Study in
Method (1943), and Introduction to Music (1945).
His dialectical analysis of Indian history suggested that
tradition and modernity colonialism and nationalism,
individualism and collectivism could be seen as dialectically
interacting with each other in contemporary India. He
attempted a dialectical interpretation of the encounter between
the Indian tradition and modernity which unleashed many
forces of cultural contradiction during the colonial era. He
focused more on the historical specificity of India’s cultural
and social transformation which was characterized less by the
“Class struggle” and more by value assimilating and cultural
synthesis that resulted from the encounter between tradition
and modernity. Concerning Dhurjati Prasad Mukerji approach
to the understanding of Indian Society, culture and change, two
points needs to be stressed.
1. First he was very much against maintaining rigid barriers
between one social science discipline and another.
2. Shared historical perspective in their studies.

According to Mukherjee to understand individual in

social science theories as an abstract individual is a narrow
concept. So it is better to understand the individual through a
holistic approach or through the psycho-sociological approach.
So the ‘synthesis of the double process of individuality and the
socialization of the uniqueness of individual life, this perfect
unity’ is called as personality. DP while defining personality
has made a distinction between the ideas of Purusha from the
western notion of individual. The relationship of Purusha and
society free of the tension or the relationship between
individual and group is the key element of understanding
Indian Society in terms of tradition. He has also analyzed the
concept of ‘knowledge’ and ‘knower’. Knowledge according
to Mukherjee is not mere ‘matter-of-factness’, but ultimately,
after taking the empirical datum and the scientific method for
its study into account, philosophic. He has emphasized on the
importance of comparative cultural perspectives and the
historical situatedness of social reality. So every systematic
body of knowledge needs to include all these aspects. Even he
has also stressed on the role of reason as an intellectual ability
to deduce or infer as the primary source of knowledge. An
attempt has been made for understanding the notions of
progress, equality, social forces and social control. So
Mukherjee has rejected the evolutionist notion of progress as a
natural phenomenon and stressed on the element of purpose in
the life of human beings. D.P. Mukherjee defines progress as a
problem covering the whole field of human endeavour. It has a
direction in time. It has various means and tactics of
development. Fundamentally, it is a problem of balance of

values. So far as human values arise only in contact with

human consciousness at its different levels, the problem of
progress has unique reference to the changing individual living
in a particular region at a particular time in association with
other individuals who share with him certain common
customs, beliefs, traditions and possibly a common treatment.
So it can be concluded from the above definition of progress
that ‘modernization’ was the special form of progress bringing
the people of third world to the second half of the 20th century.
D.P. Mukherjee in his “Modern Indian Culture: A
Sociological Study” has revealed British rule as the real
turning point for the Indian Society. He has always visualized
India as peaceful and progressive. India is born out of the
union of various elements, culture etc. According to him the
national movement in India was anti-intellectual in nature, but
it has helped in generating idealism and commitment among
the people. It was found that politics has ruined our culture.
Mukherjee believes that modernization as a process can never
be achieved by the mere imitation. Rather modernization is a
process of expansion, elevation, revitalization of traditional
values and cultural patterns. Tradition is a principle of
continuity providing the freedom to choose from different
alternatives. While discussing about the process of
modernization Mukherjee has also defined the meaning of
tradition. The sanskrtitic meaning of tradition is Parampara.
Mukherjee has classified Indian Tradition into three type’s viz.
primary, secondary, tertiary. The primary traditions are the
primitive and authentic to Indian culture. Secondary tradition

emerged with the arrival of Muslims in India. Even till the

time of British administration there was no synthesis of
traditions among the Hindus and Muslims. The tertiary
tradition reflected the differences among various traditions in
India. Traditions are supposed to have a source like scriptures,
or statements or mythical heroes etc. It is said that tradition
performs the act of conserving though not necessarily
conservative. He says that tradition do change on the basis of
three principles Sruti, Smriti and Anubhava. Among these
three principles it is the Anubhava or the personal experience
is most important. Due to this changing dimension of tradition
there is always the need of adjustment in Indian Tradition. So
Mukherjee has articulated that the Indians will not vanish like
the primitive tribes due to the impact of western culture. In fact
Indian culture is very flexible in nature which can assimilate
various cultures within it. It is the “knowledge of traditions
which also shows the way to break them with the least social
cost”.
Mukherjee’s ideas on tradition and modernity replicate
a dialectical relationship between the two. He has argued that
traditions are central to the understanding of Indian Society.
The contradiction between tradition and modernity therefore
ends up in two ways. Those are given below:
1. Conflict
2. Synthesis
Indian Society according him is also the result of the
interaction between tradition and modernity. Thus Mukherjee’s

thinking oscillates between orthodox Marxism and a

traditionalistic point of view.
Analyzing the history on Indian society Mukherjee
followed a different view of Karl Marx. Unlike Marx,
Mukherjee analyzed the positive and negative consequences of
British administration but Marx concentrates the positive
consequences of British administration. While discussing the
history of India D.P. Mukherjee has emphasized on two key
words; ‘specificity’ and ‘crisis’ the former points to the
importance of the encounter of traditions and the latter to its
consequences. Tradition in Marxist view is “the comparative
obduracy of a culture-patter” According to Mukherjee this
Marxist approach needs to be grounded in the specificity of
Indian history as Marx focuses on Capitalism as the dominant
institution of western society during that time. And it has also
pointed out the crisis of contradictory class interest of the
capitalist society. D.P. Mukherjee was also interested in
studying this historical process of the relation between
tradition and modernity. While studying this process
Mukherjee says that this can be done by focusing first on
tradition and then only focusing on the change. So to study
such historical process, it should begin with social traditions to
which the individuals have been born and then in which they
have had their being. Studying the changing dimension
Mukherjee says that, this change in tradition takes place due to
both the internal and the external pressure. Here the external
pressure is mostly the economic part. The economic pressure is
mostly about the change in the modes of production and in this

the tradition survives by adjustments. So the capacity for

adjustment is the measure of the vitality of tradition.
The stand point of D.P. Mukherjee regarding
modernization is that there is no genuine modernization
through imitation. To him people could not abandon their
cultural heritage and yet succeed in internalizing the historical
experience of other peoples; they could only be ready to be
taken over. The efforts of Raja Rammohan Roy, Rabindranath
Tagore, who tried to make the main currents of western
thought and action…run through the Indian bed to remove its
choking weeds in order that the ancient stream might flow, was
the best approach for modernization. Modernization emerges
as a historical process which is at once an expansion, an
elevation, a deepening and a revitalization-in short, a larger
investment- of traditional values and cultural patterns, and not
a total departure from them, resulting from the interplay of the
traditional and the modern. From this perspective, tradition is
not an obstacle rather it gives the freedom to choose between
the alternatives and evolve a cultural pattern which cannot but
be a synthesis of old and the new. Modernity must, therefore,
be defined in relation to and not denial of tradition. While
discussing about the process of modernization D.P. Mukherjee
has stressed the importance on the role of self- consciousness.
It is the first condition, or form, of modernization. Individual
needs to have the self- consciousness to accept the change in
the traditional values and adopt the new values.
Akshay Ramanlal Desai
A R Desai was born in 1915 at Nadiad in Gujarath and

died in 1994. He was a prominent Indian sociologist and a

renowned rural and urban sociologist. He applied the
dialectical- historical approach in his sociological studies. He
is regarded as one of the pioneers in introducing modern
Marxists approach to empirical investigations. He rejects any
interpretation of tradition with reference to religion, rituals and
festivities. His sociology is essentially a secular phenomenon
where he relies on economics to understand and analyze social
structures. He has studied topics like Nationalism and its social
configuration (1966), examined community development
programs for economic development in villages, treatment of
urban slums and their demographic problems (1972), and
finally peasant movements. For A.R. Desai, contradictions
emerging in the Indian process of social transformation arise
mainly from the growing nexus among the capitalist
bourgeoisie, rural petty-bourgeoisie and the state apparatus.
This nexus thwarts the ambitions and aspirations of the rural
and industrial working class population. For Desai, this
contradiction is not resolved but rather, takes on new
cumulative forms and methods and re-emerges as social
movements and protests. Social unrest for him is thus rooted in
the capitalist path of development followed by India, following
the legacy of the national movement. Question of how and
why nationalism developed in India led him towards his
doctoral work, completed in the early forties. Social
background of Indian Nationalism (1948) and its companion
volume Recent Trends in Indian Nationalism (1960) realize the
need for a comprehensive study of the structural
transformation of Indian society during the British period. His

concerns with understanding feudal production relations, their

role and transformation, emergence of capitalist relationships
and nationalist forces are presented in these volumes.
According to Desai’s understanding, Nationalism is a
historical category. Its development has to be understood in the
context of the social and cultural history of a country. Indian
nationalism is an outcome of a number of objective and
subjective forces which have evolved since the beginning of
the 19th century. It has emerged amongst the social and
religious diversities of the country, territorial vastness and
powerful traditions and institutions. The central thesis of both
the above mentioned volumes is that British rule destroyed the
pre-capitalist forms of production relations and introduced
modern capitalist property relations, which paved the way for
Indian Nationalism. Desai puts forth that Indian nationalism
emerged under the conditions of political subjugation of the
Indian people under the British rule. The British Empire
introduced modern capitalism for their own economic
advancement, radically changing the existing economic
structures of the Indian society, introducing a centralized state,
modern education and modern means of communications and
other institutions. This in turn led to the creation of new social
classes who achieved their own political and social power.
These social forces, because of their very nature came into
conflict with British imperialism and thus became the basis of
and provided the motive for the rise and development of Indian
Nationalism. Desai traces the growth of the national movement
in five phases, each phase based on particular social classes
which supported and sustained it.

1. The first phase of nationalism continued till 1885 when

the Indian national congress founded. In this phase the
social basis was very narrow. It was pioneered by the
intelligentsia who were the product of the modern system
of education. Ram Mohan Roy and his followers as the
pioneers of Indian nationalism.
2. The second phase of nationalism started from 1885 and it
ends in 1905. In this phase the national movement now
represented the interests of the development of the new
bourgeoisie society in India. The development in the
modern education had created an educational middle class
and the development of the Indian and international trade
had given rise to a merchant class. The modern industries
had created a class of industrialists. In the new phase
Indian national movement ‘voiced the demands of the
educated classes and the trading bourgeoisie such as the
Indianization of Services, the association of the Indians
with the administrative machinery of the state, the
stoppage of economic drain, and others formulated in the
resolutions of the Indian National Congress’.
3. The third phase of the national movement covered the
period from 1905 to 1918. During this phase ‘the Indian
national movement became militant and challenging and
acquired a wider social basis by the inclusion of sections
of the lower-middle class’.
4. In the fourth phase, this began from 1918 and continued
till the 1934. The historical importance of the year 1934
was Civil Disobedience Movement. This phase of

nationalism ended with the lasting of Civil Disobedience

Movement of 1934. The social base of the national
movement was enormously enlarged. The movement
‘which was hitherto restricted mainly to upper and middle
classes, further extended to sections of the Indian masses.’
However the leadership of the Congress remained in the
hands of those who were under the strong influence of the
Indian capitalist class: ‘It was from 1918 that the Indian
industrial bourgeoisie began to exert a powerful influence
in determining the program, policies, strategies, tactics
and forms of struggle of the Indian national movement led
by the Congress, of which Gandhi was the leader.’ Two
other significant developments during this period were the
rise of the socialist and communist groups since the late
1920s, which tried to introduce pro-people agenda in the
national movement, and the consolidation of communalist
forces which sought to divide the society.
5. The fifth phase was characterized by growing
disenchantment with the Gandhi an ideology within the
Congress and further rise of the Socialists who represented
the petty bourgeois elements. Outside the Congress
various movements were taking place. The peasants, the
workers, the depressed classes and various linguistic
nationalities started agitations for their demands.
Moreover, there was further growth of communalism.
However, according to Desai, all these stirrings were not
of much consequence and the mainstream was still solidly
occupied by the Gandhi- an Congress which represented

the interests of the dominant classes.

In Marxian approach Desai mainly tries to
conceptualize the India’s capitalist development paradigm. He
analyzed social structure on the basis of economy and class
structure. He analyzed the causes of emergence of nationalism
especially the social background of emergence of nationalism.
DP was another social philosopher concentrating on the
application of Marxian approach for analyzing Indian social
reality. He analyses Indian society from Marxian perspective
of dialectical materialism. His dialectical approach mainly
relied on the dialectical interactions commonly found in
contemporary society, like the dialectical interaction of
tradition and modernity, colonialism and nationalism,
individualism and collectivism. He mainly used dialectical
perspective for understanding the historical specificity of
cultural and social transformation of India resulted from the
encounter between the tradition and modernity. There we can
see the less class struggle and more cultural synthesis and
value assimilation.
Subaltern perspective
Subaltern perspective is a well known perspective
applied by philosophers to understand society. The term
Subaltern was coined by Italian Philosopher Antonio Gramsci
related with the concept of hegemony. The term ‘subaltern’
was coined by Antonio Gramsci in his Prison Notebooks.
Initially it was widely used to denote inferior rank in army, but
nowadays, the term subaltern implies people of inferior rank
for his/her various attributes such as economic condition, race,

ethnicity, gender, caste, sexual orientation and people are

marginalized for such attributes. Thus subaltern perspective is
the way to understand society from the below. The people who
are marginalized for various reasons in a stratified society
produce knowledge and have politics of their own. The
dominant historiography and the studies however exclude them
from their concerns. Subaltern perspective looks into those
who are neglected and marginalized and contrasts it with the
elite perspective. The term got much more popular with the
development of colonial studies, especially when a new trend
in history started writing the history of the peasants’
insurgency or rebellion and tribal uprisings in South Asia. A
group of scholars started a new trend, like Ranajit Guha, David
Hardiman, Partha Chatterjee, Shahid Amin, Gyanendra
Pandey, David Arnold, Sumit Sarkar, Dipesh Chakrabarty and
others.
David Hardiman
David Hardiman was born in Rawalpindi at Pakistan in
1947. He is a sociologically sensitive historian. As a historian
he was specialized in Modern Indian History. He is a founding
member of the Subaltern Studies group. Hardiman is one of the
many prolific writers who participated in the creation of the
subaltern perspective. Noteworthy is the fact that since 1982 at
least all his articles and books were illustrative of the practice
of subaltern studies. The main focus of his writings has been
on the colonial period in South Asian history focusing
particularly on the affects of colonial rule on rural society and
the relationships of power at various levels. In the late 1970s

he became involved with a group of historians studying the

social history of subordinate groups in South Asia. Hardiman
adopted the Gramscian idea of subaltern to analyze the
relationship between domination and subordination. Subaltern
is the concept firstly used by Antonio Gramsci an Italian
philosopher, who is used this concept as subordinate group.
Hardiman used subaltern perspective in his study of The
Coming of Devi. This is basically a movement among adivasis
of Western India to change their established way of life.
Following are the prominent works of David Hardiman
1. The Quit India Movement in Gujarat (1980)
2. Peasant Nationalists of Gujarat: Kheda District, 1917-
1934 (1981)
3. The Coming of Devi: Adivasi Assertion in Western India
(1987)
4. Peasant Resistance in India: 1858-1914 (1992)
5. Subaltern Studies VIII: Essays in Honour of Ranajit Guha
(1994)
6. Histories for the Subordinated (2006)
He has studied the Devi movement which took place in
Gujarat during 1922-23. It was Adivasi tribal movement by
tribal peasants against the moneylenders, landlords and liquor
shop owners for the harmful effects of liquor on the people of
their community. The colonial Abkari Act of 1878 banned all
local manufacture of liquor and permitted a central distillery at
the headquarter town of the district. The liquor dealers used to
pay large amount of money to the government to run the

distilleries in addition to the license to sell the liquor in the

tribal villages. The distribution of liquor badly affected the
lower caste people, especially the Adivasis. Hardiman narrates
the adverse effects in his article. In spite of certain control over
liquor sellers they continued to have a monopoly on the sale of
factory-made alcohol and its distribution amongst the clusters
of villages of Adivasis. The excise officials were being bribed
for distribution of factory made liquor and illicit distillation.
The profit made by the money lending and liquor selling by
them was huge being and was invested by them in land. The
Adivasi community was affected and got addicted to drinking.
Their lands were mortgaged or sold to the liquor shop owners.
The Adivasi peasants could gradually realize how the liquor
barons in their own villages are exploiting them, although they
failed to articulate and protest against such exploitations
because of the dominant oppressors like the liquor. But the
feeling of exploitation led them to protest among the Adivasi
subaltern groups could no longer be suppressed by the
dominant liquor barons. An interesting incident took place in
1922 as a new tradition started in the western part of Gujarat
which Hardiman calls as ‘Devi’ movement. Hardiman found
that early in 1922 an epidemic of smallpox broke out in the
coastal areas of Gujarat amongst the subaltern fishermen
communities. They believed that the smallpox was caused by a
goddess and they need to satisfy the goddess to get rid of the
epidemic. They started to organizing ceremonies to satisfy the
deity (Shamans by the goddess). It is through Shamans
(women being possessed) that the goddess passed the
information that she would be satisfied if they gave up eating,

fish, meat and drinking liquor, toddy. The people followed her
advice. The Devi movement started to be known as Salahbai.
Slowly the process of shamanism through human beings had
spread in the Adivasi villages and they also started practicing
Shamanism. The Adivasi peasants used to gather together to
listen to the women possessed by Devi. To fulfill Devi’s
demands to refrain from drinking liquor and toddy, eating flesh
and meat, along with haring regular bath. The effect of 49
Subaltern Critique was the most Adivasis socially boycotted
the Parsi liquor shop owners and the landlords, resulting into
the Adivasis starting social reforms among themselves. Their
assertions resulted in loss of business by the liquor barons,
although efforts were made by the liquor barons to bring the
Adivasis back to their old habits of drinking liquor but they
refused and refrained themselves and their belief in Devi
helped them to avoid liquor. During the mainstream anti-
colonial movement, Gandhiji incorporated Adivasis in this
movement because of their tendency of assertion and their
political voice. In South Gujarat, the Adivasis were considered
as the passive object of colonial policy. The Gandhian
nationalists of Gujarat brought them into the nationalist
movement in alliance with the middle-class. With the help of
the local narratives, memories, songs as well as the archival
materials, Hardiman examined the role of Adivasis not only in
their assertion against the money lenders, liquor barons and the
anti-liquor movement but also in the nationalist movement and
social reformation movements. Independent of outside help,
they tried to break the feudal structure of money lenders and
the colonial resource base.

B. R Ambedkar
B R Ambedkar is the father of Indian constitution,
whose contributions not confined in the field of sociology. He
has a deep knowledge in different subjects so his contribution
not confined in a specific knowledge field. He was a foremost
philosopher of subaltern studies. The various fields of
knowledge are reflected in his work like politics, sociology,
economics, History etc. Ambedkar belongs to subaltern
perspective and focuses upon the deprived and depressed
condition of the Dalits.
Ambedkar tracing the origin of dalits, he believed that
in every village there was a group of people who were residing
in its outer part and were known as broken men (Dalits today).
In primitive societies consisted of the nomadic tribes and they
had cattle as their wealth. These cattle were moved from one
place to other and these people also moved with them. As the
time passed the art of farming developed people were started
to settle down at one place and accumulated land and emerged
as a settled communities. There was always warfare between
already settled peoples and the nomadic tribes in which the
later were defeated and these defeated groups were broken into
small parts and scattered into different areas. In breaking up,
these tribes as a rule give birth to peripheral groups that he
calls the broken men. Then there was an agreement between
the settled peoples and the broken men in which the broken
men accepted the works of guards in exchange of food and
shelter. Since the broken men were the foreigners they had to
live outside of the village. Ambedkar says that the Dalits of

today are the descendent of these broken men and so of the

original resident of this country. Ambedkar also calls Dalits as
antya because according to him they had to live at the end of
the village. Caste system is the peculiarity of Hindu religion
which divides Hindu community into four major groups which
are hierarchically graded based on birth. It can be defined
differently by different thinkers some of the major definitions
are given below:
According to Herbert Risely “a caste may be defined as
a collection of families or groups of families bearing a
common name which usually denotes or is associated with
specific occupation, claiming a common descent from
mythical ancestor human or divine, professing to follow the
same professional calling and are regarded by those who are
competent to give an opinion as forming a single homogenous
community.”
According to Ketkar “caste is social groups having two
characteristics (i) membership is confined to those who are
born of members and includes all persons so born (ii) the
members are forbidden by an inexorable social law to marry
outside the group.”
According to Nesfield “caste is a class of the
community which disowns any connection with any other class
and can neither intermarry nor eat or drink with any but person
of their own community.”
Ambedkar analyzed all these definitions and stated that
these definitions display only the characteristics of caste
system not explains the system as a whole. He criticized these

thinkers they define caste as an isolated unity itself and not as

a group within, and with definite relations to, the system of
caste as a whole. In his view the caste system has either been
imposed upon the docile population of India by a law giver as
divine dispensation or it has developed according to some law
of social growth the Indian people.
Untouchability is a practice related with caste system
which was started during the reign of Gupta. Ambedkar said
that there were two reasons for the prevalence of
untouchability which are given below:
1. Buddhism
2. Beef eating
During the reign of Gupta a large number of people
reconverted from Buddhism to Hinduism. Those who did not
convert to Hinduism such as broken men were treated with
contempt and hatred by newly converted Hindus especially by
Brahmins. In support of this reason Ambedkar quoted Nikant’s
book Prayachit Mahuka in which Nikant quoted the verses
from Manu which says “if a person touches a Buddhist or
flower of Panchupat, Lokayataka, Nastika and Mahapathaki he
shall purify by a bath”. In this way it is easy to say that the
origin of untouchability may be traced to the contempt and
hatred of the Brahmins against the Buddhists. Beef eating is
another cause of the existence of the practice of untouchability.
The Brahmins hatred the beef eaters and considered as
untouchables those who ate beef. There were many groups
among the primitive tribes in India who were beef eaters and
all of them became untouchables in this way.

Ambedkar was a Dalits who is aware about the

atrocities suffering from Dalits by Hindu caste. He said that
under the rule of Peshwas in Maratha country the untouchable
was not allowed to use public streets if a Hindu was coming
along lest he should pollute the Hindu by his shadow. The
untouchable was required to have black thread either on his
wrist or neck as assigns to prevent the Hindus from getting
themselves polluted by his touch through mistakes. In Poona,
the capital of Peshwa, the untouchables was required to carry
an earthen pot which hung in neck for holding his spit, a
broom to sweep away from behind the dust he treated on lest a
Hindu walking on the same should be polluted. Balai was
another untouchable community in central India who were
suffering from various practices from the other Hindu caste
like their women have no right to wear gold or silver
ornaments and the men have no right to wear colorful pugrees
and not able to wear dhotis with colorful borders. Their women
must attend all confinement occasion of women in other Hindu
houses. Even though they occasionally visit the houses of
Hindu people they have no right to live in villages, they always
live in the border of village and the Hindu people restrict them
from to use public well and walking through the land of upper
caste people. In Chakwara village of Jaipur the untouchables
give a feast to members of his community after his return from
pilgrimage. The host served a lavish meal cooked in ghee but
they were attacked by the Hindu caste because the food cooked
in ghee.
All these proved that the untouchables are suffered

various problems like denial of fetching water form public

wells, not allowed to admit public schools, prohibited from
using public streets, they were not permitted to eat certain
kinds of food and wearing ornaments and dresses. The
untouchables are banned to entering in Hindu temples.
The practice of untouchability is a root problem faced
by untouchables related with caste system in Hindu
community. Through the annihilation of caste the untouchables
can escape from exploitation. Ambedkar says in his work
namely Bahishkrit Bharath “if Tilak has been born amongst the
untouchables he would have raised the slogan,, Swaraj is my
birth right I will have it he would raised the slogan annihilation
of untouchability is my birth right.” In pursued of this goal he
assume the role of an activist deliberately violating the
centuries old practices compelled to obey to the untouchables.
For the abolition of the practice of untouchability he started
campaign with his followers for forcefully taken water from
public wells and forcefully entering in Hindu temples. These
campaigns did not much affective so they started to make
awareness among untouchables about the depressed condition
of untouchables. Besides these strategies Ambedkar suggested
four pronged strategies for eradicating the practice of
untouchability, these are given below:
1. There should be a share in political power and in the
administrative apparatus to be given to the untouchables in
proportion to their percentage in population.
2. The untouchables should be given a fare share in the
economic life of the country.

3. There should be a frontal attack on the concept of

Chathurvarna which legitimize untouchability and also the
Hindu sacred books which support this criminal custom.
4. There should be a mass movement encouraging inert-caste
marriages, because untouchability cannot be eradicated
with the eradication of caste system.
The important among all these pronged strategy is last
one which came into existence because of the factor of
endogamy. Ambedkar said that in primitive society exogamy
was so common that nobody needed any explanation for it but
when the time change exogamy lost its importance and people
were confined to marriage within their own blood kins. In
Ambedkar’s view the law of exogamy was beneficial for the
Indian society because Indian society still a savour of clan
system and this can be easily seen in the law of marriage
which revolved around the exogamy, marriage between
Sapindas as well as Sagotras was prohibited. He further said
that endogamy was foreign element for the people of India.
There no exaggeration to say that for Indian people exogamy
was a testament and no one dare to violate it. He found that the
origin of the caste was in endogamy and so by abolishing the
endogamy it was possible to abolish caste and untouchability.
Therefore, Ambedkar states that the real remedy for abolishing
the untouchability was the fusion of blood that is inter-
marriage because he said that unless the feeling of kinship or
of being kindred become paramount the separate feeling or of
the feeling of being aliens created by caste will not vanished.
He further said that among the Hindus inter-marriage is a

greater force in social life then the life of non-Hindus. Where

society is already well knit by other ties, marriage is an
ordinary incident of life. But where society is not well knit,
marriage is only way to bind them together.
This module mainly familiarizes various approaches
used by philosophers to understand the society. Indological,
socio-functional, dialectical and subaltern are the major
approaches discussed here. The philosophers like G S Ghurye,
Louis Dumont, M N Srinivas, A R Desai, D P Mukherjee,
Hardiman and Ambedkar applied the above mentioned
approaches in Indian context, they highlights the development
of sociology through the contextualized and Indological
approaches.

MODULE 4
CURRENT ISSUES IN INDIAN SOCIETY
The fourth module discusses the current issues in

Indian society like poverty, inequality of caste and class, issues
in agrarian sector, secularism, communalism and ethnicity.
This module helps to make an idea about the current problems
in India and how can tackle these problems successfully in life.
Commonly the people see the issues as negative phenomena,
but this module provides an outlook to the impartial and
scientific analysis of the issues in society. Even though the
problems hinder the smooth functioning of the elements of
social structure, it is a source of social change so sociologists
can not confined it as a negative phenomenon. Social issues
are the problems influence negatively or positively a group of
people in society. It fundamentally hinders the smooth
functioning of society so people considered it as negative
phenomena. Various social issues poverty, secularism, threaten
to nationalism, ethnicity, problems in agrarian structure etc. are
prevalent in contemporary society. The study of social issues is
highly important in academic field because it negatively affect
the social development. Sociology is the scientific study of
social development so the contemporary social issues are
important subject analyzed in sociology. This module gives an
idea about the contemporary issues in India society and people
aware about the strategies overcome those issues.

Contemporary Issues in India

Poverty
Poverty is a crucial social problem in contemporary
India; really it is a global issue, which is not merely confined
in India. This is a problem mostly discussed in India since
independence. Even Contemporary India has not today move
slightly from that condition. Once economists more concerned
about poverty as a crucial problem but it is not merely an
economic concept, it is a social, political and philosophical
concept. It is a multidimensional in nature. Today Social
scientists are very concerned about poverty as a problem of
development and as a factor influence the all round
development of country. Social scientists it as a social
condition that is characterized by the lack of resources
necessary for basic survival or necessary to meet a certain
minimum level of living standards expected for the place
where one lives. Lack of basic necessities like food, shelter
and clothing are the main indicators of poverty. Other factors
like starvation, inequality in access of health and education,
alienation from mainstream society etc are the substituting
factors of poverty. It is a global issue produced by uneven
distribution of material resources and wealth, income, de-
industrialization of western countries, exploitative effects of
global capitalism etc. Poverty is not merely an opportunity or
fate it is condition produced by human beings in society. The
causes and consequences of poverty in country to country is
different especially in developed and developing countries. So
the causes of poverty in India are different which are given

below:
1. Population explosion: It means the uncontrollable
increasing of population in a region. It shakes the
development of a region. Population explosion is an
important reason of poverty in India. India’s population
has steadily increased through the years. During the past
45 years, it has risen at a rate of 2.2% per year, which
means, on average, about 17 million people are added to
the country’s population each year. This also increases the
demand for consumption goods tremendously.
2. Low Agricultural Productivity: A major reason for
poverty in the low productivity in the agriculture sector.
The reason for low productivity is manifold. Chiefly, it is
because of fragmented and subdivided land holdings, lack
of capital, illiteracy about new technologies in farming,
the use of traditional methods of cultivation, wastage
during storage, etc.
3. Unemployment: Unemployment is another factor causing
poverty in India. The ever-increasing population has led to
a higher number of job-seekers. However, there is not
enough expansion in opportunities to match this demand
for jobs.
4. Inefficient Resource utilization: There is
underemployment and disguised unemployment in the
country, particularly in the farming sector. This has
resulted in low agricultural output and also led to a dip in
the standard of living.

5. Price Rise: Price rise has been steady in the country and
this has added to the burden the poor carry. Although a
few people have benefited from this, the lower income
groups have suffered because of it, and are not even able to
satisfy their basic minimum wants.
6. Lack of Capital and Entrepreneurship: The shortage of
capital and entrepreneurship results in low level of
investment and job creation in the economy.
7. Social Factors: Apart from economic factors, there are
also social factors hindering the eradication of poverty in
India. Some of the hindrances in this regard are the laws
of inheritance, caste system, certain traditions, etc.
8. Colonial Exploitation: The British colonization and rule
over India for about two centuries de-industrialized India
by ruining its traditional handicrafts and textile industries.
Colonial Policies transformed India to a mere raw-material
producer for European industries.
9. Climatic Factors: Most of India’s poor belong to the
states of Bihar, UP, MP, Chhattisgarh, Odisha, Jharkhand,
etc. Natural calamities such as frequent floods, disasters,
earthquake and cyclone cause heavy damage to agriculture
in these states.
10. A short rate of economic development: In India the rate
of economic development is very low what is required for
a good level. Therefore there persists a gap between the
level of availability and requirements of goods and
services the net result is poverty.

11. Government’s Unplanned planning: Government

introduced various plans for the upliftment of poor people
but that is not get to them due to lack of awareness, and
knowledge. Government or the agents of governments
cannot assure the implemented programs are not get to the
suitable persons the result is poverty.
12. The unequal public distribution system: India is not an
educationally developed region so people are not aware
about the facilities provided by the government for the
upliftment of the poor people. The knowable persons
effectively used the public distribution system but the
unknowable persons not knowing about that.
13. Lack of follow up of the planning programs: Even
though an auditing system existing in our country the
resources are not getting to the eligible persons. The
programs are introduced by government but the
government not bothered about the effective
implementation of the program, which is an important
cause of poverty.
Types of poverty
Poverty can be divided into two on the basis of
characteristics like relative and absolute poverty, it is a general
classification. In accordance with time changing different types
of characterization of poverty seen in academic field case
poverty, asset poverty, concentrated collective poverty etc. are
such type of classification.

Relative poverty
It is defined from the social perspective that is living
standard compared to the economic standards of population
living in surroundings.
Absolute poverty
It is a condition where household income is below the
necessary level to maintain basic living standard.
Case poverty
Case poverty refers to the inability of an individual or
family to secure basic needs even in social surroundings of
general prosperity. This inability is generally related to the
lack of some basic attribute that would permit the individual to
maintain him or herself. Such persons may, for example, be
blind, physically or emotionally disabled, or chronically ill.
Physical and mental handicaps are usually regarded
sympathetically, as being beyond the control of the people who
suffer from them.
Asset Poverty
It is a condition suffering from a person in which a
person cannot afford any assets for fulfillment of his basic
needs for a period of three months.
Concentrated collective poverty
In many industrialized, relatively affluent countries,
particular demographic groups are vulnerable to long-term
poverty. In city ghettos, in regions bypassed or abandoned by
industry, and in areas where agriculture or industry is

inefficient and cannot compete profitably, there are found

victims of concentrated collective poverty.
Inequality of caste and Class
Human societies vary in the extent to which social
groups as well as individuals have unequal access to
advantages. Natural and social inequalities are the two types of
inequality commonly found in our society. The natural
inequality emerges from the unequal division of physical and
mental abilities among the members of a society and the social
inequality arise from the social entitlement of people to wealth
or economic resources, political power and status regardless of
potential abilities possessed by individuals. Not only economic
resources of societies vary according to the level of
development and structural features of society, but also
different groups tend to have differential access to these
resources. Caste and caste stratification are the two
stratification system used by sociologists to denote the social
inequality in society. In many pre-industrial agrarian societies,
access to social opportunities and status was determined by
birth. The ascribed role or status of individual was assigned by
virtue of factors outside his or her own control such as birth,
sex, age, kinship relations, and caste. This assigned role was
rationalized as divinely ordained and natural. Indian caste
system was another type of validation of social hierarchy. The
society moved from the principle of hierarchy to stratification.
According to the sociologists, hierarchy prevailed in societies
based on castes. Stratification, on the other hand, is a feature of
modern industrial societies in which inequalities do exist but

are not considered as a part of natural or divine order. In this

process of social change, inequality did not vanish or reduce,
but changed its nature. Now class boundaries became more
porous and permeable, individual mobility is possible and
society’s normative order is based on formal equality.
Caste
Caste is a stratification system in India society. The
English word caste derived from Portuguese word casta
meaning pure breed. The word refers to a broad institutional
arrangement that in Indian languages, beginning with the
ancient Sanskrit, is referred to by two distinct terms, Varna and
Jati. Varna, literally ‘color’, is the name given to a four-fold
division of society into Brahmins, Kshatriya, Vaishya and
Shudra, though this excludes a significant section of the
population composed of the ‘outcastes’, like people engaged in
work of cleaning, leather works etc. sometimes referred to as
the Panchamams or fifth category. Jati is the word most
commonly used to refer to the institution of caste in Indian
languages, In its earliest phase, in the late Vedic period
roughly between 900 — 500 BC, the caste system was really a
Varna system and consisted of only four major divisions.
These divisions were not very elaborate or very rigid, and they
were not determined by birth. It is only in the Post-Vedic
period that caste became the rigid institution that is familiar to
us from well known definitions. In early period it was based on
occupation, then birth became the base of caste status.
Different theories supporting the unequal status of different
caste people, divine theory is one among them, which states

that each caste derived from the body of Brahma or Purusha.

Brahmins derived from the head of the Brahma, and Kshatriya
from hand Vaisya from belly or thigh and Shudra from feet.
The status and occupation of each caste is fixed on the basis of
place of origin. The occupations of Brahmins are related with
intellectual, so they are engaged in teaching, writings etc.
Kshatriyas are warriors, they derived from hand of Brahma.
Vaisya are the merchants; they are derived from belly or
thighs. Shudra are derived from feet of Brahmin so their status
is lower and they are engaged in the occupations like cleaning,
washing etc. The higher caste is pure and lower caste is impure
so their occupation is unclean. The food is also different of
lower caste and high caste. The higher caste food is prepared in
Ghee, it is known as Pucca food and the food of lower caste is
prepared in water which is known as Kacha food. Caste
inequality is high in Indian society even today. Even though
various laws related with the eradication of untouchability the
lower caste people suffering various caste inequalities in
society, school, occupational spaces etc.
Class
Class is a stratification system commonly found in
India as well as in world. Class societies are characterized by
the horizontal division of society into strata. The actual
configuration of social classes varies from one society to
another. The rise and growth of Indian social classes was
organically linked to the basic structure of colonialism and
bore the imprint of that association. Karl Mark is a prominent
figure in class study, who define classes based on their

differential access to the means of production. The dominant

classes appropriate the ‘surplus’ produced by other classes
through their control of means of production, and thus exploit
their labour. Class is simply means a stratification system
mainly based on economic status. Upper, middle and lower is a
simply a basic level of class stratification system. The class
stratification is different from one society to another society. In
fact it is an urban phenomenon, the upper class again divided
into upper upper class, upper middle class, upper lower class,
then each major classification like middle and lower class
again divided into substitutes like this. Classes have different
characteristics certain characteristics are given below:
1. Hierarchical classification: Hierarchy means the step by
step classification. Because the classes are arranged in an
order of step by step, higher class arranged in a top of
hierarchy and lower class in the bottom and middle class
arranged among upper and lower, class is a hierarchical
organization.
2. Economic base: The class stratification formed on the
basis of economic aspects like wealth, money, goods, job
etc. Even though education determines the class status
ultimate and major criteria is economy.
3. Open stratification system: The class status is not stable.
At any time of life it may change, in accordance with
changing the economic status of a person the class status
will change that may high or low so class is an open
stratification system.

4. Achieved status: An individual achieved his class status

through personal achievement and he/she can change his
class status at any time of life so class is an achieved
status.
5. Class is a status group: An individual’s status may high or
low in status scale, class is a social group constituted by
people with equal economic status.
6. It is universal: Stratification is found in every society it is
universal. Class is found in all societies rural as well as
urban so it is a universal phenomenon.
7. Class consciousness: Class consciousness is the inevitable
characteristic of class. It means the common
consciousness of members in a class, they feels a feeling
of oneness.
Because of the Indian business classes exhibit a
complex intertwining of functions, a clear- cut demarcation
along the lines of merchant, industrial and finance capital is
not possible in case of India.
The British capitalists and merchants controlled the
upper layer of Indian economy represented by the big joint
stock companies, managing houses, banking and insurance and
major export import firms. Despite obstacles and constraints,
the Indian capitalist class grew slowly and steadily and
breached white ‘collective monopoly’. With all structural
constraints, colonialism also guaranteed the security of private
property and sanctity of contract, the basic legal elements
required for a market-led growth. The expansion of foreign

trade and commercialization eased the capital shortage and

accelerated the growth of sectors where cost of raw-materials
was low such as cotton textiles, sugar, leather, cement, tobacco
and steel. Certain groups of Parsis, Marwaris, the Khojas, the
Bhatias and Gujarati traders benefited from their collaboration
with the European companies and pumped their resources into
the manufacturing sector. This Indian capitalist class grew,
diversified to some extent and acquired important position by
1940s. This class thrived during Independence under the
government’s policy of import substitution and quantitative
controls.
The class-composition in the rural areas also bears the
stamp of colonialism. The older group of rural gentry, although
its wings were clipped away by the British colonial regime,
was retained and transformed into a kind of rentier class of
landlords invested with newly defined property rights on land.
This was especially true of permanently settled Zamindari
areas of Bengal and Taluqdari areas of Awadh. This
landlord-rentier class generally emerged from the pre-existing
groups’ of Zamindars and Taluqdars who had enjoyed the
rights of revenuecollection under the pre-British regimes. They
exercised “extra-economic’ feudal coercion over their small
marginal share-croppers. Since the Congress Party favoured a
bureaucratic rather than mobilisational form for carrying out a
gradual social transformation after Independence, the power
and privileges of these semi-feudal agrarian magnates
remained intact in some areas. These classes now managed the
new democratic polity. The failure to implement radical

agrarian reforms meant that the availability of resources and

accessibility to spaces within the new polity to the socially
marginal groups remained limited.
The rich farmers, however, are numerically the most
important proprietary class in the rural areas. In areas outside
Zamindari settled areas of Bengal, the colonial state settled
land- revenue with dominant cultivating groups. A class of rich
farmers emerged from these groups. They took advantage of
the expanding market networks under the colonial economy
and they had resources like sufficient arable land, livestock,
implements and better access to credit. They also became less
dependent on money lenders and they took to usury
themselves. The Jat peasants of Punjab and the Upper Doab,
the Vellalas in Tamilnadu, the Kanbi-Patidars of South
Gujarat, the Lingayats of Karnataka and the Kamma-Reddy
farmers of Andhra constituted this group. The tenancy
legislation under colonialism and after Independence initiated
the process of transfer of landed resources from non-
cultivating, absentee landlords to the enterprising rich farmers.
Some older groups of rentier landlords also converted
themselves into this class. The political clout of this class grew
as it drew encouragement from state’s policy of providing
price-supports to agricultural produce and from liberal
provisions of subsidized inputs such as water, power,
fertilizers, diesel, credit and agricultural machinery. This class
is easily identifiable by the ownership of landed and other
agricultural resources. In 1970s, about 20% households of the
rich farmers owned about 63% of rural assets such as land,

livestock, building, and implements. This disproportionate

access to rural assets is combined by its control over wage
labour which is used to produce a sizeable marketable surplus
by this class. The other pole of rural social-structure is the
world of semi-proletariat having little or no control over
productive resources. The agricultural labourers are a
predominant group with little or no guarantee of a regular
employment, often burdened by coercive domination of rich
farmers. The bureaucratic-managerial elite also constitute a
significant class in India as the relatively weak capitalist class
at the time of India’s Independence was not in a position to
completely subordinate the highly developed administrative
state apparatus. The growth of non-market mechanisms and
planning in the allocation of resources and economic patronage
also resulted in the expansion of bureaucracy. This class
expanded in the post-colonial phase with the spreading out of
education and need for professional and white-collar jobs
involving new skills and expertise. This is not merely an
auxiliary class of bourgeois as there are conflicts of interests
between the public sector professionals and private capital.
The command over knowledge, skills, tastes and networks of
relationships are notable features of this class.
Issues in agrarian sector
The major economic activity in India was agriculture
hence the backbone of Indian economy was agriculture. But
today the relevance of agriculture not low, Indian economy
became a mixed economy. Agriculture in India has never been
smooth sailing, as it is always confronted with one or the other

problems. The life of the peasants being largely dependent

upon agriculture has never been easy as his livelihood is
determined by several social and environmental factors.
Exploitation of the peasants by the merchants, middleman,
money lenders etc., gamble with monsoon and inadequate
irrigation, crop diseases, costly agricultural inputs, fluctuating
and un-remunerative agricultural inputs, smallholdings, low
yield from land are some of the important problems of
agriculture. Agricultural crisis in India is not something new.
There have always been agrarian crises in India. These crises
may be individuals specific, crops specific, class’s specific or
regional specific. However, the nature and the extent of these
crises have been changing from time to time with changing
policies and conditions at both national and international level.
The agrarian crisis began with the advent of British rule
in India. In fact, the process of the agricultural deterioration
started with the introduction of new land system by the
imperialist rule. It laid a foundation for the capitalist form of
agriculture by introducing Zamindari and Ryotwari systems.
The British policies had a far reaching impact on Indian
agrarian society. It culminated into the lop-sided and
unbalanced situation of agriculture, overcrowding and
underdevelopment, de-industrialization, the low yields, the
waste of labour, the sub-division and fragmentation of lands
the growth of absentee landlordism, exploitations of tenants,
steep rise in the rural debt, serfdom, poverty etc. The agrarian
economy was in a state of acute crisis. The economic misery of
the rural people was unbearable. In general the agrarian

situation was explosive during British raj in India. The

ceaseless discontent and unrest that often busted in the form of
peasant uprising, insurrections, struggles, movements etc was
the reflection of acute agrarian crisis that exited in the rural
society. Even after independence the conditions which led to
agrarian unrest arising out of agrarian crisis did not change
much.
The land reforms introduced by the government were
largely in favor of the land owning class. Many loopholes left
within the laws along with their resources, power and
influence helped the Zamindars to evade them. The indifferent
and apathetic attitudes of the administration also contributed
significantly to the failure of land reforms. The insufficient
budgetary allocations were another constraint in the
implementation of land reforms. The green revolution was
another blow to peasants. The main components of Green
Revolution like high yielding variety of seeds, mechanization
of agriculture, utilization of chemical fertilizers, pesticides etc.
helped the landed class rather than the poor peasantry, as the
poor peasants has not enough resources and land to make use
of these. In fact, green revolution resulted in the growth of
agricultural capitalization and uneven distribution of income.
The community development program was yet another step
taken by the government to improve the lot of the weaker
section of the society. Most of the community development
programmes were for the agricultural development.
Consequently, a small group of rich agriculturists benefited
from them. Integrated Rural Development and other

programmes introduced in the later years met with similar

consequences.
The roots of the agrarian crises are multiple and change
with changing policies, environment and global political and
economic situation. The agrarian crisis in contemporary India
is the result of cumulative effect of several factors operating
since long. The roots of this crisis can broadly be discussed
under the following headings:
1. Impact of British rule: The genesis of today’s agrarian
crisis can be traced to the British rule. The adverse
agricultural policies of the British government caused
irreparable damage to the agricultural sector. The British
introduced a revolutionary change in the existing land
system. The new land relations and revenue system
created adverse conditions to the peasants. It not only led
to feudalism but also to fragmentation and sub-division of
land. Commercialization of agriculture introduced India
into international market. As a result, the Indian
agriculturists began to produce for the Indian and the
foreign market. This led to the exploitation of the Indian
Peasantry by the middle man, money lenders and
merchants. Thus, the Indian Agriculturists were subjected
to all the vicissitudes of the market. The shift from food
crops to cash crops leading to the opening of paths to the
world markets increased the need for credit. At the same
time, the rising value of the agricultural land, the legal
provision for sale, purchase and mortgage and also the
favorable administrative machinery facilitated the

operation of money lenders in the rural areas. As a result,

rural indebtedness swelled during the British rule.
Ironically, even after more than six decades of
independence, Indian is plagued with these and other
problems of the British rule. The country has utterly failed
to address these problems successfully.
2. Failure of Government Programs and policies: After
independence govt. has introduced several policies and
programmes to deal with agricultural problems in
particular and rural backwardness in general. However,
the defective and lopsided policies (policies formulated
without diagnosing rural problems) of the government
have created adverse conditions to the rural populace. The
government programmes like land reforms, green
revolution, community development programmes, IRDP
etc have failed to yield the expected results. The land
reforms and green revolution ended up in creating
capitalist land lords and capitalism in agriculture. The
green revolution also increased the indebtedness among
the peasants. It has resulted in environmental problems
like over exploitation of ground water resources and
consequent decline in its level, loss of soil quality etc.
3. Inadequate public investment and corruption: The public
investment in agriculture sector has always been less
compared to its need. It has particularly dwindled with the
structural adjustments or economic reforms introduced
during 1990’s. The rural development expenditure as
percent of GDP was 14.5 during the 7th plan (1985-

1990), 11.7 during 1991- 92, 6.0 during 1995-96, 5.6

during 1997-98 and 5.9 during 2000-01. As if this is not
enough, the widespread corruption has further drained the
financial resources of the agricultural sector.
4. Impact of liberalization: The liberalization, privatization
and globalization policy of the government had multi-
pronged effects on the agriculture in India. There was a
paradigm shift in the government expenditure from
agriculture and rural development to industrial and urban
development. The withdrawal of the state from the public
expenditure affected the investment in critical areas like
water supply, power, health, education and infrastructure.
Several mechanisms created and institutionalized by the
state to promote green revolution either became defunct or
become inactive. Agricultural subsidies saw reduction
resulting in increased agricultural cost. The removal of the
tariff barriers subjected the Indian agricultural products to
the prices determined by the forces of the world market.
5. Natural factors: Agriculture in India is largely affected by
variations in factors associated with nature. Even today
agriculture in India gambles with the monsoon. Frequent
occurrence of floods and droughts affect the agriculture
badly. Due to climatic changes and other factors, spread of
crop diseases has become common. The problem of
insects and pests causes substantial agricultural loss to the
peasants.
6. Misplaced priorities of the government: We seem to have
forgotten the well-known and widely accepted thoughts

“the development of India lies in the development of

villages”, “India lives in villages” and “agriculture is the
backbone of Indian economy”. Our priorities and thrust
areas of development have changed from agriculture to
industry, tourism, information technology, mining and
urban areas. Our emphasis is not on sustainable
development with equity. Our focus is on achieving higher
growth rate within limited time to get the political
mileage. We seem to be in race to achieve faster growth with
little regard for the sustainability and equity. The poor
budgetary allocations to agriculture and rural areas have created
a “rural-urban divide”. Therefore, the agriculture sector is
suffering from number of problems like irregular power supply,
inadequate irrigation, absence of storage facilities, lack of
roads, transportations etc. There has to be paradigm shift in our
thrust areas of development. Agriculture sector should receive
the priority it had received during initial five year plans.
7. Sharp increase in agricultural costs: Due to sharp decline
in the subsidies, the costs of agriculture inputs have risen
sharply. The commercialization of agriculture has
compelled the peasants to use fertilizer, modern
technology, power, pesticides and insecticides, irrigation
etc. The labour cost has also gone up. The peasants also
have to spend on transportation of the produce. All these
factors have contributed to the increase in agricultural
cost. To crown all this, the spurious seeds and adulterated
insecticides, pesticides and fertilizer increase the woes of
the peasants.
8. Unremunerative prices: Agriculture today is subjected to

the vicissitudes of the international market. The removal

of quantitative restrictions on imports and reduction in
tariffs levels has resulted in large scale imports of
agricultural products and also stiff competition from
exports in the international markets. Also, the free trade
agreement has increased the competitiveness. These have
affected the prices of agricultural products negatively.
Non-remunerative prices have put the peasants in great
loss. There is no fixed and permanent price for any
agricultural produce. The prices vary frequently beyond
the imagination of common man.
9. Fragmentation and sub-division of land: In India the
landholdings are very small and they are spread at
different places. This renders them uneconomic and
unviable. The peasants cannot use the modern technology
on these fragmented and sub-divided lands. It also leads to
waste of time and energy. The effect of all these is low
yield per acre and consequently low income for peasants.
10. Land acquisition by the government for the public
purposes: Acquisition of cultivable and fertile land is a
cause of concern. Quite often such lands are acquired
without conducting socio-economic impact study. The
compensation is generally less, and is in the form of cash.
The illiterate and ignorant farmers, in the absence of
investment plan spend the money for unproductive
purposes. Thus, they lose not only their land, habitat but
also money. In the absence of clear and definite
rehabilitation policy, the displaced people are subjected to

social and economic suffering. Recently, the land

acquisition bill is passed by the parliament, which is said
to protect the interests of the people. We will have to wait
and see how best it is going to be implemented.
11. New agricultural reforms: More and more reforms are
come in agrarian field like green revolution, introduction
of new seeds, mechanization of different phases of
agriculture land plowing, seed dispersal, weeding etc. But
these reforms negatively affect the peasants. The new
agricultural reforms helpful to the big agriculturists.
Secularism
The word secularism is derived from the Latin
saeculum, meaning a generation or this age. The term
secularism is first used by the British writer George Holyoake
in 1851. Holyoake invented the term "secularism" to describe
his views of promoting a social order separate from religion,
without actively dismissing or criticizing religious belief. The
term used in different dimensions like religious, philosophical
and sociological. The word was first used in religious
dimension. The Thomistic synthesis of Greek and Hebrew
thought by dividing knowledge into the upper and lower
storey, the upper belonging to theology and the universals and
the lower belonging to philosophy and the temporal or secular,
led to the development of the concept of the ‘secular’ as
contrasted to that of the ‘religious. In religious sense the term
used to denote the movement from religious to non-religious
condition. In Philosophical sense the word secularism is used
to denote an ideology or a system of doctrines and practices

that rejects any form of religious faith and worship.

Sociologically, the term secularism refers to the theory that
argues the irreversibility of the evolutionary progress of
society from primitive fear through animist, polytheist,
pantheist, and monotheist ages, to a fully scientific age when
religion will have nothing of importance for man. It simply
refers to socio-cultural processes that enlarge the areas of life –
material, institutional, and intellectual – in which the role of
the sacred is progressively limited. In all expressions
secularism conceptualized as the ideology of belief in non-
religious aspects.
India is a multi-religious country where secularism
deserves very importance. It is mainly concentrates on thinking
out from religious beliefs. Secularism never advocates for
abandonment or neglecting of religion or religious principles
but it advocates for respecting all religion.
Communalism
Communalism is a term used to denote the ethnic or
group identity, which is came into use during the British
colonial administration. Communalism is a political
philosophy, which proposes that market and money be
abolished and that land and enterprises to be placed in the
custody of community. But in the Indian sub-continent
context, communalism has come to be associated with
tensions and clashes between different religious communities
in various regions. Development of communalism as political
philosophy, has roots in the ethnic and cultural diversity of
Africa. It is characterized as, People from different ethnic

groups or community, who do not interact much or at all

and this has somewhere acted as hindrance in the
economic growth and prosperity of Africa. Communalism
in South Asia is used to denote the differences between
the various religious groups and difference among the
people of different community. And generally it is used
to catalyze communal violence between those groups.
Communalism is not unique only to South Asia, but is
also found in Africa, America, Europe, Australia, and
Asia. But, it is significant socio-economic and political
issue in Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, Myanmar, Sri Lanka,
Nepal, etc. If we discuss about Indian society, we will find
that, ancient India was united and no such communal feelings
were there. People lived peacefully together; there was
acceptance for each other’s culture and tradition. For example,
Ashoka followed religious tolerance and focused mainly on
Dharma. In Medieval period, we have examples such as
Akbar, who was epitome of secular practices and believed in
propagating such values by abolishing Jazhiya tax and starting
of Din-I- ilahi and Ibadat Khana. Same acceptance for different
cultures and tradition was practiced in several kingdoms
throughout India, because of which there was peace and
harmony, barring few sectarian rulers like Aurangzeb, who
was least tolerant for other religious practices. But, such
motives were guided purely for their personal greed of power
and wealth. Such rulers and actions by them like- imposing
taxes on religious practices of other community, destructing
temples, forced conversions, killing of Sikh guru, etc. were
instrumental in deepening and establishing the feeling of

communal differences in India. But, these incidents were not

common as, huge majority of Indians were rural and were
aloof from such influences and so people coexisted peacefully.
Though, they were very rigid in practicing their own rituals
and practice, but it never became barrier in the peaceful
coexistence. Overall, the Hindus and Muslims in those days,
had common economic and political interests.
Communalism in India is result of the emergence of
modern politics, which has its roots in partition of Bengal in
1905 and feature of separate electorate under Government of
India Act, 1909.Later, British government also
appeased various communities through Communal award
in 1932, which faced strong resistance from Gandhi ji and
others. All these acts were done by the British government to
appease Muslims and other communities, for their own
political needs. This feeling of communalism has deepened
since then, fragmenting the Indian society and being a cause of
unrest. India is a land of diversity. And it is known for lingual,
ethnic, cultural and racial diversity. Communalism has threat
to India’s unity in diversity. It developed in India as different
stages in first stage rise of nationalist Hindu, Muslim, Sikh,
etc. Roots of this were led in later part of 19th century with
Hindu revivalist movement like Shuddhi movement of Arya
Samaj and Cow protection riots of 1892. On the other hand
movements like Faraizi movement started Haji Shariatullah in
Bengal to bring the Bengali Muslims back on the true path of
Islam, was one of the religious reform movement which had
bearing on communalism in 19th century. Second stage was of

Liberal communalism, it believed in communal politics but

liberal in democratic, humanist and nationalist values. It was
basically before 1937. For example organisations like Hindu
Mahasabha, Muslim League and personalities like M.A.
Jinnah, M M Malviya, Lala Lajpat Rai after 1920s. Third was
the stage of Extreme Communalism, this had a fascist
syndrome. It demanded for separate nation, based on fear and
hatred. There was tendency to use violence of language, deed
and behaviour for example Muslim League and Hindu
Mahasabha after 1937.Following are the major causes
of communalism in India which are given below:
1. Tendency of Minorities: The minority groups are fail to
mingle in national mainstream. Most of them do not
participate in the secular nationalistic politics and insist on
maintaining for separate identity.
2. Orthodoxy and obscurantism: The orthodox members of
minorities feel that they have a distinct entity with their own
cultural pattern, personal laws and thought. There are strong
elements of conservatism and fundamentalism. Such feeling has
prevented them from accepting the concept of secularism and
religious tolerance.
3. Design of leaders: Communalism has flourished in India
because the communalist leaders of both Hindu and Muslim
communities desire to flourish it in the interest of their
communities. The demand for separate electorate and the
organization of Muslim league were the practical
manifestations of this line of thought. The British rule which
produced the divide and rule policy, separate electorate on the
basis of religion strengthened the basis of communalism in

India Ultimately the partition of the country into India and

Pakistan provided further an antagonistic feeling towards each
other.
4. Weak economic status: Due to low economic status a
majority of majority of minority in India has failed to adopt
the scientific and technological education. Due to their
educational backwardness, they have not been represented
sufficiently in the public service, industry and trade etc. This
causes the feeling of relative deprivation and such feelings
contain the seeds of communalism.
5. Historical causes: The historical occurrences like Bengal
partition, demand for separate electorate, and demand for
communal states etc. in colonial period leading to growth of
communalism.
6. Provocation of other countries: Certain countries
communally provoke other countries or regions, these
countries may enemy countries or not. Some foreign countries
try to destabilize our country by setting one community
against the other through their agents.
7. Negative impact of mass media: The messages relating
to communal tension or riot in any part of the country
spread through the mass media. This results in further
tension and riots between two rival religious groups.
Growth of communalism in India has more and more
causes; some of themare mentioned here.
Ethnicity
The word ethnicity comes from the root word ethnic
means race. Ethnic groups are a group of people, who share a

common culture, believes, language, rituals etc. Ethnic activity

and separation came in a big way in the post-colonial, newly
emerging nations like Malaysia, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nigeria
etc. The problem of ethnicity has been widely discussed over
the past few decades. The phenomenon of ethnicity has
become all intrinsic components of the socio-political realities
of multi-ethnic or plural cultural societies, especially in a
country like India. In India, with its variety of pluralities, in
terms of language, race, religion and so on ethnic conflict has
become a part of the political scenario. In most countries,
including India, the processes of development and change have
generated conditions for ethnic conflict, as the fruits of these
development processes have come to be distributed unevenly.
Ethnicity is not a problem it is a self-consciousness of a group
of people united, or closely related, by shared experience such
as language, religious belief, common heritage, etc.
Ethnicity involves a feeling of consciousness among
the members of an ethnic group of the existence of such shared
characteristics. It also involves the process of mobilization of
people along some common point of reference for presenting a
united front to articulate their socio-economic or political
interests. Ethnicity, thus, involves the process of interaction
between two or more groups. Barthes (1969) says that the issue
of the identification of social boundary is intrinsic to the
concept of ethnicity. Each ethnic group draws a boundary to
identify its own members and to distinguish the “we” group
from other ethnic groups.
India has been a witness to rising ethnic tensions and

conflicts in recent years. Many sociologists have, quite rightly,

highlighted the problems encountered in the process of nation-
building as a consequence of increasing ethnic problems.
Ethnic upsurges and, assertions of cultures‟ in India are the
consequences of excesses of modernization and the
homogenizing trend of modern states.
Causes of ethnic problem in India
1. Multi-ethnic character of India: It is characterized by a
large diversity in its population with multitudes of castes
and several religious, linguistic, cultural and racial groups
living here. Because of intense competition for scarce
economic resources and the heightened consciousness
among people of different groups to preserve their age-old
cultures, India has always been vulnerable to assertions of
ethnic identities.
2. Lopsided economic development of the country: Because
of lopsided economic development some groups feel that
they have been marginalized and completely left behind in
the process of development. This makes them highly
susceptible to the politics of ethnicity.
3. Representative parliamentary democracy in India where
different ethnic groups (castes, religious groups, linguistic
groups etc.) compete for political power by stressing on
horizontal solidarity and consolidation of shared interests.
4. Increasing politicization of caste and religion. Caste and
religious identities are often whipped up by political
leaders to mobilize people for their vested interests and

petty political mileages

5. Fear among minorities (both linguistic and religious) that
they might get assimilated into the dominant culture
leading to the dilution of their cultural heritage. Hence,
there is an increasing stress on ethnic identity to forge
horizontal solidarity. Such feelings have also increased
because of the process of globalization and cultural
homogenization occurring everywhere. Cultural
globalization is even causing the Hindu majority to assert
itself and is spawning Hindu revivalism in India.
6. Intense feeling of alienation among the tribes of India
because of faulty development policies, leading to forced
displacement from their age-old inhabited land and forest,
reducing them to abject poverty and destitute.
Various types of ethnic identities are found in India
which caused to certain ethnic problems. Particular language,
region, particular religion, etc. are the characteristic of ethnic
groups, so they agitated for the protection of their culture like
linguistic ethnicity, regionalism, communalism etc.
Nationalism: Views of Tagore, M K Gandhi, Nehru,
Constitutional views
Nationalism is an abstract concept and concrete reality.
It is a positive consciousness of unity, homogeneity and
national aspiration. It is emerged in Europe in 19th century with
the social and political changes of European nations.
Enlightenment in Europe was the main reason behind the
emergence of nationalism. Before the 19th century many social

and political revolutions like American Revolution, French

revolution, etc. took place, which helped the emergence of
nationalism. In third world countries nationalism emerged
because of colonization and colonial domination. Religion,
language, culture, ethnicity, economic, political and social
conditions etc. are the important factors which played key role
in emergence of nationalism in third world countries. Various
philosophers like Tagore, Gandhi, Nehru etc. differently
conceptualized nationalism. All of them analyses it related
with freedom movement. All of them perceived it as an idea
and a movement. Nation simply means a large body of people
united by common history, culture or language inhabiting a
particular territory or country. Nationalism is a feeling of
natives in nation.
Rabindranath Tagor
Rabindranath Tagore was born in Calucutta. He is a
Bengali Poet, Writer, philosopher Social reformer and painter.
He reshaped Bengali literature and Music as well as Indian art
with contextual modernism in the late 19th and early 20th
centuries. He was the first Non-European to receive the Nobel
Prize for literature. In 1901 Tagore founded an experimental
school in rural West-Bengal at Shantiniketan, where he sought
to blend the best in the Indian and Western Traditions. He
wrote the Scholarly works, which are personal and political.
Gitanjali, Gora and Ghare-Baire etc. are some important works
of Tagore. He composed national anthems of two countries,
India and Bengladesh which are reflected the feeling of
nationalism. Even though, he denounced nationalism whose

political ideas vested in nationalism.

Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941), popularly known as
Gurudev, expressed his views on Indian nationalism on various
occasions. A collection of his speeches on nationalism was
published in 1917 with the same title and one of the speeches,
included in the book, denotes Tagore’s unconventional,
integrated views on Indian nationalism. Tagore’s views on
nationalism are much ahead of time. A substance of his
deliberation is that the true spirit of nationalism lies in its
broad humanistic concern rather constrained political strategy.
The spread of fanatic nationalism during the First World War
might have forced him to interpret and blame it as an evil
epidemic. He was trying to subvert the popular idea of
nationalism which was more a political justification that
encouraged grabbing other nations and their resources.
Tagore’s perception of nationalism has mainly relied on
ancient Indian philosophy, where the world was accepted as a
single nest. He argues further that if anyway India decides to
contribute the world; it should be only in the form of
humanity. Humanity is the paramount in the life which helps to
grow the nationalism. Humanity should be formulated through
various means of life. In this way, Tagore was striving to
dissociate himself from the general belief of nationalism and
trying to associate it with ideas such as peace, harmony and
welfare. Tagore’s idea of humanism goes beyond any
boundaries or barriers and seeks at large a common place
where humanity comes before any other kind of identity. He
adds further that the saints such as Nanak, Kabir, Chaitanya

ignited the flame of humanism in Indian minds. But

unfortunately, it was faded over time with an aggressive rise of
racism and caste-based disintegration of our society. Nations
with spiritual integration, love, and sympathy for others may
find a permanent place in any age. Thus, Indian nationalism or
nationalism of any kind is nothing but a mixture of integrated
ideals of humanity and human welfare. It should be a tenable
progression that outsets within.
M K Gandhi
Gandhi’s idea on nationalism was different from
European nationalism. His nationalism was inclusive; there
were no enemies within as with European nationalism. Gandhi
never sees the nation as standing above the people, people
sacrifices an entity for which the people only made sacrifices;
rather, the raison d’être of the nation was to improve the living
conditions of the people, or to “wipe away the tears from the
eyes of every Indian. Unlike European nationalism, it was not
imperialist itself; the people whom the nation was to serve
treated other people with fairness. This nationalism was not a
mere idealist construct; it was based instead on a very practical
understanding of what was required for the people’s freedom.
He accepted the idea of nationess with unity.
Modern Indian theory of political resistance was based
on the concept of nationalism. It was developed by the Indian
thinkers to educate the Indian people about the evil effect of
British rule in India and to instill confidence in their minds that
they had capacity to overthrow the British rule. Indian
nationalism under Gandhian leadership took a different

approach because of his experience in South-Africa. He had a

definite philosophical to assess the nature of nationalism in
India. He believed Swaraj and Home rule achieved by united
Indian nation. Hind Swaraj is a prominent work of Gandhi
which documented the growth and development of Gandhian
thought.
The actual development of Gandhi’s concept of
nationalism developed in indirect route, for Gandhi entered in
world political stage not from India but form South Africa. His
idea of nationalism does not start with the locality and then
gradually extends itself to the province and finally to the
nation. His unique political philosophy and political technique
developed from Transvaal, former province of South Africa.
He had worked close harmony with Muslim leaders, and he
followed soft behaviour to Muslims, because he knew the
condition of Muslims in India as a native in a pluralistic
country like India. Due to that reason Gandhi support Minto-
Morley recommendations for providing special status to Indian
Muslims. His conception of nationalism was neutral. He saw
people of India as people in single nation not thinking on the
basis of sects. Savarkar identified the nationalism as s Hindu
nationalism and he believed in war, as a dharma for Hindu in
this context Gandhi thinks of nation in terms of Praja rather
than Rashtra. Gandhi’s idea of Praja stood for the idea of
people of community and Rashtra is the idea of power.
According to Gandhi Indians are Praja. His idea of nationalism
believes in non-violence and humanism. Nationalism survives
diversity and empathy. It is a bonding force.

Gandhi’s nationalism was broad and inclusive. His

nationalism was based on Ahimsa, Karmayoga, Ram Rajya,
Tapasya and Moksha. He mainly rejected violent nationalism.
He used the terms like Swaraj, Swadeshi, and Indian
civilization instead of nation. His idea of nationalism reflected
through his life and activities.
Jawaharlal Nehru
Regarding Nationalism his views are both a result of
his adherent patriotism as well as result of the impact of past
tradition of the country and impression forms the modern
nationalistic tendencies flowing world-wide. He believed that
nationalism is the result of psychological unification of making
of a centre in geographical area due to the impact of past
tradition, culture and history. It also underlines the common
identity of the people. He further, explained nationalism in
terms of memories of the past and vision for the future.
Nehru emerged as both as a leader and ideologue in the
freedom struggle. He developed understanding of the major
ideologies of the world and in the perspective tried to shape the
political thinking in order to select the most suitable for India.
His main contribution lay in fact that instead of formulating
any new ideology, he tried to reconcile the merits of the
ideologies he preferred. His understanding of the world as well
as of the Indian history helped him to formulate his ideas on
nationalism. Nehru emerged on the political scene when the
country was fighting for its independence and the dominant
political ideology was nationalism. He was perfectly aware of
the fact that India was being exploited under the colonial rule.

So he recognized the major role of nationalism and developed

his own ideas.
Nehru sought to interpret the essence of ideology of
nationalism prevailing in India. Indian National Congress is an
important organization was leading the freedom movement.
They stood for liberalism and always favored and admired the
British system before the advent of Gandhi as the leader of the
national movement. Then Gandhi in freedom movement
followed a non-liberal attitude with British people. Nehru also
followed the view of Gandhi. During the reign of British
Indians failed to make rapport between British people because
the British practiced racial discrimination and always kept a
distance from the natives. Nehru observed that it could not e
denied that the British established rule of law, efficient
administration and parliamentary government. All these paved
the way for growth of Indian nationalism.
He emphasized the role of socio-economic factors in
growth of nationalism. He identified three periods of British
rule in India which is the early period which came to an end in
the late 18th century when merchant adventures traded and
plundered indiscriminately, the second period covering the 19th
century when India became a source of raw materials for
British industries and market for British manufactured goods
and the third period which was one of the capital investment in
Indian industry and which had started actively from the first
world war. Entry of British commodities into the Indian
market ruined the local cottage industry, making these workers
unemployed. British government further imposed tax upon

import to machines to prevent the building of factories in

India. British policy in India was fulfilling their vested interest
and they are trying to grow the sectarianism among Indians.
However, his ideas of nationalism did not allow him to find
permanent location in only India’s past heritage. According to
Nehru the burden of past was not always good, so he wanted to
inherit all the humanity had achieved, because Indian heritage
was not exclusive. So he tries to find a suitable model of
nationalism to India. This prompted Nehru to take stock of the
developments of the ideology of nationalism in European
continent. Democracy and nationalism emerged in the last
quarter of the 18th century France when it stood for ideas of
unity democracy and culture.
During the days of freedom struggle, he started
thinking in terms of internationalism. He under the influence
of communism, tried to look for a socialistic world free from
the social disparities and international barriers. Thought teller
he was somewhat dismayed with the violent methods of
communism and maxims instead Gandhi's non-violent
satyagrah become more prominent and shed casting effect on
his mind. Therefore socialism was Indianized by Nehru and he
statured talking of socialistic pattern of the society. For this,
purpose after independence his ideas were directed towards the
mixed economy. During the days of foreign rule also he started
working for the liberties of individual in the sphere of social,
political and economic sphere. Democracy in his opinion is
based on the idea of toleration for others views and thus,
allows the positive freedom of others too. Here, he also

appreciates the Panchayath Raj System of India which has

travelled through centuries and is most successful tradition of
participative democracy. Such democracy, in Nehru's opinion,
I bred on the respect for equality and liberty of all and thus
lead to brotherhood among people. Moreover the democracy
he favored must be based on the ideas of equality of gender, of
economic classes, of caste and of religion. He wanted to
modernize Indian society scientific tradition and to rise above
the might’s, superstitions and dogmas of religion and caste
barriers. As a secularist thinker, religion for Nehru was a
matter of personal development on spiritual lines. He was
against any dogmatic which could lead to communalization of
society in the name of god. He called the Indian masses to rise
above such distinction of religion. Even during the speeches
and tasks at constituent assembly, he spoke in favor of raising
the faith of isles in the political system. He was against the
hegemonies of majority community of India and also
emotional back mailing of the minorities. He wanted to
provide equal opportunities in society finical system to cell.
Due to his efforts in this regard he is considered d a true
secularist of who has great impact on India society. Nehru's
travelled the various riots affect parts of country during
partition and tried to convince people about the harmonicons
living. He was the sole leader who was listened by the
minorities during those days.
Nehru's ideas about internationalism which started
grooming during freedom movement found their fuller
expression teller in terms of his foreign policy and

international relations. His internationalism has roots in his

ideas of individual freedom and nationalism.
He was against the Darwinian concepts of survival of
fittest’. Instead Nehru wanted to utilize the energies of
powerful beings and nations for the wellbeing of so called
weak nations. He thought that international cooperation while.
Establish a peaceful world which intern will provide better
place for the growth of individuals and nations. Therefore, the
nationalism in terms will provide better place for the growth of
individuals and nations. Therefore, the nationals in terms of
ascertain of national self respect was right for him, but not as
aggression and expansionism and imperialism. He was the
critic of imperialism as nationalist, and same too as an
internationalist.
Here he believed in dankness of mankind as a creation
of one God. Therefore, he was against inculcation of any
disparities in the minds of the masses in few name of caustic
class or religion in this way it can be said, that Nehru was a
firm believer in the ideas of individual freedom, a patriot and a
nationalist.
Nationalism means a feeling of oneness of a nation. All
these views of thinkers highlights nationalism as a feeling
acted back of freedom struggle, but Tagore analyze it as
humanism. Even though Nehru quoted nationalism as a feeling
acted back of freedom movement, it also highlights the relation
with other nations.
The last module of this paper mainly analyzed the

contemporary social issues in Indian society, these are the

basic problems and these still exist in present day society. The
paper discussed the development of sociology for India and the
contemporary issues in Indian society.

References
Desai, A R- Rural sociology in India
Kolenda. P M - Caste in Contemporary India Srinivas M N –
Social change in Modern India
D N Dhanagare – Themes and Perspectives in Indian sociology
Deshpande, Satish- Contemporary India
Singh, Yogendra Modernization of Indian Tradition

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SOCIOLOGY OF INDIAN SOCIETY

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 1

resources and the social problems in India.

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 2

production in Indian villages has continued uninterrupted for

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 3

village. Cotton is grown in almost all parts of the country. The

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 4

system given to them in the social and economic structure of

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 5

except in the early periods of the Vedic period, women were

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 6

in the social, ideological, economic and administrative life of

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 7

have emerged for various religious and non-religious activities

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 8

They were the main cantonments as most of the army was

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 9

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 10

did not exist in British pre-India.

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 11

transformed into a progressive capitalist economy. Therefore,

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 12

the land. Second, from an administrative point of view, in the

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 13

market, which may be mortgaged, bought or sold. It set the

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 14

the farmer was forced to follow old methods for means of

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 15

as a result of bad monsoon. The land use system established by

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 16

power producers to supply Indian farmer’s higher products

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 17

members of the village community. Village committees

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 18

merchants and (7) The modern class of money-lenders.

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 19

economically and socially perhaps the strongest class in India.

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 20

numerous and significant. They made the development of

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 21

inaugurated in India and the legal and political regime

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 22

communication and the British rule and laws caused the

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 23

Movement of 1921-2 and the Non-Cooperation Movement of

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 24

Important posts in the British Government were held

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 25

Indians was small in the first decades of the nineteenth

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 26

Muslims and other communities, were organized by the

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 27

structure, social institutional framework based on caste system

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 28

effortlessly developed among the individuals. The British

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The press was the main tool by which nationalist

School of Distance Education, University of Calicut 30