It's nothing that requires much research. The current national government openly supports discrimination on religious and caste based backgrounds. 7 years of this, and people who used to think "Caste is a taboo subject, and we should be working around it", now think "Caste pride is cool".
Hmm the current Prime Minister of India is from a "lower" caste. The current president of India is from a "lower" caste. Curious how you come up with "the current national government openly supports discrimination on religious and caste based backgrounds".
The Indian caste hierarchy works in complex ways. The very top and the very bottom are confirmed, but everyone in the middle just kind of gets mixed together.
If you’re Indian, you know it too - the OBC category is just political hogwash (disclaimer: I’m from an OBC category)
Probably not, I do think the current government leans a bit more towards religious intolerance than co-existence.
I do however take issue with bashing the government for every social justice issue du jour. It’s convenient but very distracting for all sides involved. For example GP here accuses the current government of caste intolerance. If you think about it though it doesn’t make much sense, given the Indian government’s nationalist agenda of uniting all Hindus and instilling in them pride for their culture etc. Sowing caste divisions would be the exact opposite of what they would want to do in this scenario.
That’s precisely the problem: the current government has promoted blind pride in native (Hindu) culture but has never sought to promote any discussion on some of the flaws in that culture.
The Manusmriti, for instance, has been referenced and quoted by several ministers and politicians. Yet no one has addressed the deep casteism in it.
The government doesn’t promote casteism - I agree with that. But promoting Hindu pride without addressing some of its issues eventually gets you casteism.
> it is always the lowest ranks that complain about a lack of equality. It is the sour grapes fox story all over again.
I wonder if you'd complain about them grapes if your caste's job was to clean toilets/sewers and nothing else. With no hope or support to pursue any other line of work, irrespective of merit or personal interests. To be humiliated, looked down upon, shunned all your life and be denied access to quality education, water, public services just because of the circumstances of ones birth - and it goes for your children too.
Merit has no basis in the caste system. In fact, it exists only to maintain the status quo. Case in point...
>If you're a warrior, and you have a son, you train him in your ancestral warfare, thereby giving him the best of nature. And if you had begotten him on a warrior lady, you gave him the best of nurture too. Both his genes and his upbringing are designed to bring out the best potential, benefiting both him and society. And your son automatically has a job waiting for him (yours) when he finishes schooling.
The rest of your message lacks logic or signs of empathy for people who'd been dealt the wrong end of the stick. Sure, not all humans are born equal, but to deny ones right to a better life based on social hierarchy defined millennia ago is downright evil and should not have any place in modern society.
Religion, especially in public life, has made a big comeback under the current ruling party. This party is also generally considered an upper-caste party. I assume much of it is due to implicit soft support from the ruling establishment.
A lot of Vaishyas have been certifying themselves as Backward caste in order to obtain affirmative action privileges. Including the dominant caste in Gujarat, the Patels - with the Patidar movement.
Modis were added to OBC list in 2002. This is a subversion of affirmative action which was meant to help lower castes, not upper castes.
BJP is primarily composed of upper castes. Only performative functions like Presidency are granted to lower castes.
Can confirm this. My caste is OBC as well, even though it is among the most politically powerful and is classified as a warrior caste with high percentage of land ownership.
Heck, in my home state, Rajputs, former rulers, have been lobbying to get categorized as OBC because of the reservation benefits.
Strictly from a resource allocation standpoint, it makes sense to keep economic flows within a subpopulation rather than diluting them over a broader population. Consider, "buy local" initiatives.
I imagine that hypothetical Republicoin and Demacoin currencies would find strong support among the hard-core true believers of the respective groups for the same reasons.
