How old is caste system in india

Like many migrants to America from India, Suraj Yengde is well-educated. At 30, he has a doctorate and a masters of law. Since , he has done graduate and post-graduate research at Harvard University. But the socio-economic background of the scholar-activist differs greatly from that of most Indian immigrants, one of the best educated groups of immigrants in the country.

He is from a small city, at least by Indian standards, where his father worked a series of menial jobs. Yengde was born into a family of "Untouchables," now more commonly known as Dalits. Most Indian immigrants are from upper castes. The caste system is the Hindu social and religious hierarchy, created a few thousand years ago.

Traditionally, a person's caste is determined at birth and channels them into that caste's occupation. At the top are Brahmins, priests and religious scholars. At the bottom are Dalits, who are technically outside the caste system and do the dirtiest jobs — cleaning sewers, taking away dead animals, tanning leather and other tasks considered to pollute a person in Hinduism.

Of India's 1. Related: Indians in America adrift from caste. Yengde's remarkable life trajectory illustrates the immense obstacles that Dalits face in India, and how he overcame those hurdles and arrived in the United States. Yengde, other Dalit activists and respondents to a survey say that — when surrounded by others of Indian descent — caste bias follows them to what many have long regarded the land of the free.

Yengde, now a fellow at the Shorenstein Center at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, grew up in Nanded, in the western state of Maharashtra, on whose coast Mumbai formerly Bombay is located. Nanded, far inland, has a population of , Mumbai's is 21 million. I traveled with Yengde back to his hometown last year to explore the stigmatizing effects of India's caste system that immigrants have imported to the United States.

At elections, many caste groups still vote as a block and are wooed by politicians looking for electoral gains. As a result, what was originally meant to be a temporary affirmative action plan to improve the lot of the unprivileged groups has now become a vote-grabbing exercise for many politicians. BBC - Religion- Hinduism. How did caste come about?

Image source, AFP. How does caste work? India's caste system is among the world's oldest forms of social stratification surviving to this day. Is the system legal? BR Ambedkar, a Dalit, authored India's constitution.

What about job quotas? Later on the Aryans who created the caste system, added to their system non-Aryans. Different Jatis who professed different professions were integrated in different Varnas according to their profession.

Other foreign invaders, who conquered parts of India and created kingdoms, were integrated in the Kshatriya Varna warrior castes. But probably the Aryan policy was not to integrate original Indian communities within them and therefore many aristocratic and warrior communities that were in India before the Aryans did not get the Kshatriya status. Share Via.

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Edit Profile. Subscribe Now. Untouchability outside India: The practice of untouchability is often associated with Hinduism and believed to be found only in India. But as per encyclopedia. Reforms in Modern India: The barriers of caste continued to strengthen over centuries, until voices of reforms emerged from the colonial India. In the nineteenth century, Jyotirao Phule questioned the discriminatory social system which had rendered lakhs of people poor, ignorant and illiterate.

He fought for equal rights and education for lower classes. In early twentieth century, Bhimrao Ramji Ambedkar catalyzed political mobilization of the oppressed. Post independence, the relevance of caste system in Indian society has certainly reduced but not diminished.

Thanks to law, an open display of caste discrimination in offices, markets and places of worship has reduced to a large extent; however, perceptions and prejudices in private matters like marriage and household have continued to exist.

The Bottomline: There is no denying that caste system has shaped the Indian society for a long time, possibly due to an abridged interpretation of ancient texts and epics. This has given rise to widespread oppression and hereditary entitlements which continue even today. It is to be ensured that the steps taken to undo the harm done by such medieval practices are made more effective and do not create further inequality in the society.

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