Analysis by Ranjit Devraj
NEW DELHI, Aug 18 (IPS) – Strident voices are rising against the Indian coalition government’s move to
identify people by their caste background in the ongoing census.
India has not included caste as a category in census enumerations since
1931. This form of social hierarchy, based on descent and traditional
occupation, has continued to be a feature of social and political life on the
subcontinent. Caste originates in Hinduism, but Christians and Muslims are
not immune to it.
The vast majority of marriages continue to be caste-endogamous, with
matrimonial columns in newspapers subdivided according to caste. Violation
of the caste code by young couples invites social ostracism or, at worst,
honour killing.
Caste groups form readymade vote banks, and are carefully nurtured by
politicians. Several regional parties are closely identified with a particular
caste, such as the Samajwadi Party (SP) in the northern Uttar Pradesh state
and the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) in eastern Bihar.
SP leader Mulayam Singh Yadav and the RJD’s Lalu Prasad Yadav openly
promote the largely peasant but upwardly mobile Yadav caste. Both the
‘Yadav chieftains’ as they are often referred to in the Indian media, have
served as state chief ministers and central government ministers.
The SP and RJD, the main drivers in parliament behind the move to include
caste in the census questionnaire, provide issue-based support to the ruling
Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA).
In the face of SP and RJD charges in Parliament that the government is
dragging its feet, defence minister Pranab Mukherjee, who heads a group of
ministers charged with formulating policy on the issue, announced that what
is under consideration is ”how and when this should be done.”
Supporters of the move say that without accurate statistics on caste numbers,
development programmes will be difficult to implement fairly.
At issue particularly is the exact size of a group officially classified as other
backward classes (OBCs) which have been variously estimated to form
between 40 and 60 percent of India’s population and into which large caste
groups such as the Yadavs fall.
”We need a scientific count of the OBCs if they are to be given the benefits of
reservation policies,” says Sitaram Yechuri, a member of Parliament who
represents the opposition Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M).
”Enumeration of the OBC groups will quickly settle disputes about their actual
numbers and yield vital information on their socio-educational and economic
conditions,” says Prof. Yogendra Yadav, senior fellow at the New Delhi-based
Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, and a respected demographer.
According to Prof. Yadav, the government has no choice but to do a head
count of the social groups that it has already recognised through laws and
policies. He says it must also heed court directions to settle the issue of
numbers so that affirmative action can be implemented. ”OBC enumeration
should have been carried out at the last census in 2001 when the policy of
reservations for this group was already in place,” he says.
Meanwhile, Sabal Bharat (Strong India), a grouping of eminent public figures,
is devising a strategy to head off caste enumeration until it can be examined
by an all-party parliamentary committee that takes into account the opinion
of jurists, statesmen, demographers, academics, and of the state assemblies.
Sabal Bharat founder Ved Prasad Vaidik told IPS the issue is too important to
be ”dealt with summarily by only a small group of ministers or the political
leaders of the present Parliament, because it will impact future generations.
”The fact is that major political parties do not want to take responsibility for
the initiation of this dangerous move, but they are anxious to preserve their
vote banks,” said Vaidik.
Both the Congress party and its main rival, the pro-Hindu Bharatiya Janata
Party (BJP) have, over the last two decades, been marginalised in Uttar Pradesh
and Bihar, states which together are home to 273 million people.
Hindu society was originally divided into priests (Brahmins) at the top of the
hierarchy, followed by warriors (Kshatriyas), traders (Vaishya) and the serving
classes (Sudras), but this fourfold order became divided and subdivided over
the centuries into thousands of closed, hereditary groups. Most OBC groups
are today identified with the classical Sudra caste.
Caste-based discrimination was outlawed by India’s 1950 constitution but
prejudices persist, especially in rural areas where 70 percent of India’s 1.2
billion people live.
The Dalits who fall outside the caste system face extreme prejudice. The
government has set quotas for them in Parliament and other legislatures, and
in government jobs and educational institutions.
A government decision to extend affirmative action for ‘other backward
classes’ (OBCs) who fall between upper caste Hindus and Dalits has led to
protests from the ‘higher’ castes and also groups like Sabal Bharat working for
the eradication of caste.
”Caste is a social evil that must be stamped out rather than endorsed through
the census,” said Vaidik. ”I am a Brahmin but have a Dalit son-in-law, and I
never cared to ask him what caste he belongs to.”
The government introduced a bill in the current monsoon session of
Parliament to deal with a spate of sensational ‘honour killings’ in recent
months over inter-caste marriages. The debate on caste has informed the bill
to deal with honour killings.
Separately, the Supreme Court demanded in June that state governments
report to it on steps to deter honour killings. Across parts of northern India
caste violence is often at least tacitly blessed by village councils that
disregard the rule of law.
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