Revision summary
Caste no longer monopolises Indian social explanation. Srinivas showed mobility through Sanskritisation and dominant castes. Béteille saw class rise without the death of caste identity. Marriage, elections, and atrocities keep jati empirically alive. Multi-cultural India needs caste plus class, gender, and region.
Model answer
Introduction
Caste is no longer the only key to Indian society. It has not become a museum piece. M. N. Srinivas and André Béteille still help: ritual rank changed, inequality and identity did not vanish. Multi-cultural India is language, religion, region, class, and jati.
Body
What has weakened
- Urban occupations, the Constitution, and reservations broke the old legal varna state. A software park does not display a village jajmani chart.
- Srinivas’s Sanskritisation and dominant caste already showed mobility and politics, not a frozen Manu.
- Inter-caste dining in cities, and class mixing in malls, make everyday caste less visible to the elite eye.
What remains relevant
- Marriage is still largely endogamous. Matrimonial columns and apps filter jati even when the office does not.
- Béteille argued that caste as a closed status system was yielding to class, yet caste as identity and network survived. Elections, khap disputes, and caste associations illustrate the second life.
- Atrocities, manual scavenging, and campus exclusion show hierarchy as violence, not as a forgotten custom.
- Multi-cultural claims of language and religion often sit on a caste base: a ‘Hindu’ or ‘Tamil’ public is still internally ranked.
Elaborate with the right answer
- Caste has lost monopoly as the sole explanation. It has not lost relevance. Class, gender, and region must sit beside it, as Béteille insisted, without a premature obituary.
Flow diagram
flowchart TD OLD[Ritual hierarchy] --> W[Weaker in law and city jobs] ID[Endogamy vote atrocity] --> R[Still relevant] CL[Class region religion] --> M[Multi-cultural reading] R --> M
Conclusion
Caste is less total in law and office than in 1950. It remains a primary tool for marriage, vote, and humiliation. Multi-cultural India is misread if caste is declared irrelevant.
Quick related
Students also ask
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Do you agree that regionalism in India appears to be a consequence of rising cultural assertiveness? Argue.
Next question on this syllabus topic (2020 · Q10). View answer →
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Does urbanisation kill caste?
It hides some rituals. It rarely kills marriage rules or surname networks.
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Is class enough now?
Class matters more than village textbooks allowed. It does not replace caste as a full account.
PYQ trend
When UPSC asked this
Related PYQs from other years, newest first. Open a question to read it.
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2022 · Q18 · GS I · 15 marks
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Distinguish between religiousness/religiosity and communalism giving one example of how the former has got transformed into the latter in independent India. (250 words).
More from this topic
Q9 · UPSC Mains 2024 · GS I · 10 marks
Intercaste marriages between castes which have socio-economic parity have increased, to some extent, but this is less true of interreligious marriages. Discuss.
Social Empowerment, Communalism and Secularism
Intercaste marriage has increased a little where education, income and urban life already match. The Hindu Marriage Act does not bar intercaste unions. The Special Marriage Act offers a civil path. The rise is selective and still a minority practice. Caste violence has not vanished. Interreligious marriage is rarer because personal law, conversion fears and honour politics raise the cost. Class can sometimes buy a caste exception. It rarely buys a religious exception in today’s climate. Constitutional choice of partner exists. Social enforcement is still family and community.
Q20 · UPSC Mains 2023 · GS I · 15 marks
Discuss the impact of post-liberal economy on ethnic identity and communalism.
Social Empowerment, Communalism and Secularism
After 1991, markets, private jobs, and mass media grew together. Ethnic claims for language, tribe, and new states continued inside that growth. Communal mobilisation used television, rumour, and later social media. Riots and polarising politics showed that GDP does not cancel religious conflict. The market can mix people at work and still sell identity at home and at the vote.
Q19 · UPSC Mains 2023 · GS I · 15 marks
Why is caste identity in India both fluid and static?
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Sanskritization, migration, and quota politics make caste claims move. Endogamy, atrocities, and caste associations keep rank sticky. The office can be fluid while the wedding remains static. Law bans untouchability; practice often does not. Both words in the question are therefore right at the same time.
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