Caste is a form of social stratification characterized by endogamy, hereditary transmission of a style of life which often includes an occupation, ritual status in a hierarchy, and customary social interaction and exclusion based on cultural notions of purity and pollution.

The caste system in ancient India was used to establish separate classes of inhabitants based upon their social positions and employment functions in the community.

Caste and political power. The caste system has traditionally had significant influence over people’s access to power. The privileged upper caste groups benefit more by gaining substantially more economic and political power, while the lower caste groups have limited access to those powers.

The caste system provides a hierarchy of social roles that hold inherent characteristics and, more importantly, remain stable throughout life (Dirks, 1989). An implicit status is attached to one’s caste which historically changed from the social roles to hereditary roles.

The main castes were further divided into about 3,000 castes and 25,000 sub-castes, each based on their specific occupation. Outside of this Hindu caste system were the achhoots – the Dalits or the untouchables.

There is mobility in the system and jatis have changed their position over the centuries of Indian history. However, the jati moves up the social scale as a group and not as individuals. At the same time, a jati can also move up in the caste hierarchy.

Caste and religion are often used as key social variables and given priority in national and state policies. The population of India is classified into four caste groups, namely: scheduled castes (SC), scheduled tribes (ST), other backward classes (OBC) and others.

Caste is popularly understood as a uniquely Indian and Hindu system of social organization. Caste groups are unequal, ranked on a scale of hierarchy on the basis of their ritual status, from pure to impure. The hierarchy is sanctioned by the Hindu religious belief.

Sociology is a social science concerned with the study of society and human behaviour and relationships. The subject matter is diverse and can cover anything from race, social class, crime and law, poverty, education and more theoretical wider issues such as the impact of radical change to whole societies.

India’s caste system was officially abolished in 1950, but the 2,000-year-old social hierarchy imposed on people by birth still exists in many aspects of life. The caste system categorizes Hindus at birth, defining their place in society, what jobs they can do and who they can marry.

Dalit

Although discrimination on the basis of caste has been outlawed in India, is still exists in the community today.

This shows the caste system originated 1,575 years ago, during the Gupta dynasty, possibly during the reign of Chandragupta the Second or Kumaragupta the First.

In 1935, Parliament passed the Government of India Act 1935, designed to give Indian provinces greater self-rule and set up a national federal structure. The reservation of seats for the Depressed Classes was incorporated into the act, which came into force in 1937.

Hinduism reinforced a strict social hierarchy called a caste system that made it nearly impossible for people to move outside of their social station. Emperors during the Gupta empire used Hinduism as a unifying religion and focused on Hinduism as a means for personal salvation.

More importantly, their superior position in society and their superior knowledge stems from birth. This makes them naturally, intrinsically superior to all other humans, so superior that they form a separate species (jati) altogether. Nothing can challenge or alter this fact. No one becomes a Brahmin, but is born so.

Shandilya