Revision summary
Caste organises booths, tickets, and reservation blocs. Srinivas’s dominant caste still explains many rural seats. Bailey treated caste teams as political machines. Class and communal crises can cut across jati, then caste returns. Contemporary politics uses caste as arithmetic more than as shastra.
Model answer
Copper italics in this answer — like this — are the key facts. Each one is unpacked in the Facts & figures rail.
Introduction
Caste remains the local grammar of Indian politics. Parties speak development; booths still count jati.
Body
How it works
- M. N. Srinivas’s dominant caste still delivers numbers in many rural seats.
- Reservations, OBC blocs, and Dalit parties turned jati into a constitutional vote, not only a ritual rank.
- F. G. Bailey already saw caste teams as political machines. Television and phones scaled that machine.
Limits
- Class, religion, and region cut the same jati. Urban youth may hide caste and still marry it.
- Communalism can override caste in a riot week, then caste returns at the ticket.
- Relevance is therefore high in mobilisation, not as the only identity.
Flow diagram
flowchart TD C[Caste] --> D[Dominant caste numbers] C --> R[Reservation blocs] C --> P[Party tickets]
Conclusion
Caste is still the most reliable political arithmetic in much of India. Law and media changed its form; they did not retire it.
Quick related
Students also ask
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Write about the contribution made by Christoph von Fürer-Haimendorf to tribal anthropology in India
Next question on this syllabus topic (2016 · Q2(a)). View answer →
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Did urbanisation end caste politics?
It hid some talk. Marriage, housing, and tickets still track jati.
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Is this the same as communalism?
Communalism organises religion. Caste politics organises jati. They can ally or clash.
Same topic · past papers
UPSC has asked this before
These previous-year questions sit on the same topic. Open one to practise the earlier ask.
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2021 · Q1(e) · Anthropology GS 2 · 10 marks
Factionalism and politics in rural India. -
2021 · Q5(e) · Anthropology GS 2 · 10 marks
Politics of recognition and deprivation.
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