“They can’t go on being pampered” is the refrain often heard in India. The irony that those who have ruled India for centuries on the basis of birth are now keen to honour the principle of merit is lost on them. They argue that merit should be the only deciding factor. They say that the quotas for Dalits in college admissions and government jobs are unnecessary because this policy has empowered Dalits sufficiently by now and discrimination on the basis of caste has disappeared.
Only Christians had a relatively low figure of five per cent.įor many years, the middle classes have attacked India’s affirmative action policy for Dalits, formerly known as untouchables. Even Sikhs (23 per cent) and Muslims (18 per cent), whose religions are meant to be free of caste, practise untouchability. It covered 42,000 households across the country and across religions.Īsked if they practised untouchability in the sense of not allowing a low caste person to enter their kitchen or touch their dishes, 30 per cent of Hindus and 52 per cent of Brahmins admitted they did.
The largest survey ever to look at caste attitudes has been carried out by the National Council for Applied Economic Research in New Delhi and the University of Maryland.
So the lie so beloved of the Indian elite – that the caste system is moribund and no one bothers about anyone’s caste any more – has been nailed.
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