CASTE POLITICS IN INDIA

CASTE POLITICS IN INDIA

Caste politics in India refers to politics played by politicians to get votes from a particular caste community and this is normally done through a policy of appeasement. It was first started by Babu Janjan Ram from the Congress in 1970s.

Historically, the basic limitation of lower caste mobilisation in the north was its failure to break out of the Sanskritisation mould in contrast to western and southern India where caste movements were questioning Hindu religious culture. In Tamil country, the multi-layered ideology of Dravidianism emerged out of opposition to Brahmanism and Brahmin institutions of colonial rule, and in the hands of Periyar became associated with a vision of Dravidian and Shudra primacy against Aryan Brahmanism. In Maharashtra, Jyotiba Phule blamed Brahmins for the deprivations of the lower castes and hence of the many ills of society. There are three tendencies in lower caste politics in north India: Laloo Yadav's cultural critique and opposition to upper caste-class privilege; Mulayam Singh Yadav's substitution of upper castes politics with a model of a peasant-cum-caste politics; and Mayawati's Dalit power agenda.

Caste system has been in India for a very long time. Various attempts to eradicate it has resulted failure, so much so that Dr. Ambedakar even decided to convert to Buddhism to escape. The Indian Government officially abolished the caste system in 1950 after the enactment of the Constitutions. Untouchability was abolished under article 17. It forbids discrimination of caste under Article 15. However the leaders still realized that enactment of this would not be enough since it would require changing the mindset of the public and for this a reservation system was created. Reservation was given to Schedule Tribes (STs) and Schedule Castes (SCs) and Dalits. Reservation was supposed to be removed after ten years of independence, however ten years later there was still a strong discrimination against the lower caste and hence through a constitutional amendment it was extended. In time the situation has not changed while the reservation only increased from political bodies to administrative bodies to educational bodies. Article 47 provided promotion of educational and economic interests of SCs, STs and other weaker sections. Also there is the ST and SC Commissions that oversees the welfare of SCs and STs.

THE MANDAL COMMISION

In 1979 the Mandal Commision was set up to identify the socially or educational backward. It was headed by an MP, Bindheshwari Mandal to consider the question of seat reservations and quotas for people to redress caste discrimination.

The Commission gave reservation from 27% to 49% in government jobs and universities. It introduced OBCs (Other Backward Classes) . The Commision laid down certain criteria on which if a community passed it could become an OBC. The big controversy over addition of OBCs is that if a community is backward in a particular State or area it did not mean that community is backward in others. For example the Jats in Bihar are backward but the Jats in Punjab are quite well to do.

CASTE IN TODAYS PLOTICS

Caste plays an important role in politics. Though reservations provisions have been there since independence there seems to be a slow change in the minds of the people. Interestingly the tenure of the reservations provision will be getting over in a year.

Indian parties playing vote bank politics make sure that they have people from these communities to show that they are representation that community. So much so that Parties that are special appealing to these communities have been set up such as Janta Dal, BSP (Bahujan Samaj Party).

The BSP can be called revolutionary party in terms of caste politics. The Party was set up (1984) Kanshi Ram. The party claims to take inspiration from Dr. Ambedakar. The party claims to represent all the repressed people. The significance of this in 2007 BSP lead by Mayawati, a Dalit leader captured power in Uttar Pradesh. For the first time in India a Dalit leader can boast of such feats.