Surinder S. Jodhka

Ascriptive hierarchies: Caste and its reproduction in contemporary India:

Social science literature on caste tends to view it as a peculiar institution of the Hindus, emanating from their past tradition and religious beliefs/scriptures. This view also presumes that the processes of urbanization and industrialization, unleashing the process of modernization, will end caste, eventually producing a shift from a closed system of social hierarchy to an open system of social stratification based on individual achievement, merit and hard work. Drawing from a large volume of recent writings the author argues in this article that this approach to the understanding of caste is based on an assumption of Indian exceptionalism. Such an orientalist view of caste also denies the possibility of deploying the framework of caste for understanding caste-like ascriptive hierarchies that exist in many other (if not all) societies. Some of the recent theorizations of caste could perhaps provide useful conceptual tools for developing a comparative understanding of social inequalities.

Sikhs in contemporary times: religious identities and discourses of development

Dominant narrative of the scholarship in Sikh studies has been historical and theological, focused mostly around questions of interpretations of the Sikh scriptural authority and the Sikh past. The rise of the Khalistan movement during the 1980s also generated a good amount of research on the political sociology of the Sikh ethnicity. But the changing nature of social and economic life of the Sikhs, their internal dynamics and divisions, their experience of development over the last five or six decades, or the effects of globalization and migration on the social well-being of the community have mostly remained marginal concerns with the scholars of Sikhism. Drawing mostly from the available primary and secondary sources, in this paper, I try to deal with some aspect of the Sikh social and economic life in India, focusing specifically on the internal differences and dynamics of the Sikh population in different parts of the country.

Caste: experiences in South Asia and beyond

This special issue of Contemporary South Asia seeks to capture the diversity and situatedness of the caste experience and deepen our understanding of caste dynamics and lives in the twenty-first century. In this Introduction, we highlight the continuing salience of caste, offer an overview of theoretical understandings of caste and foreground the importance of analysing caste in the present as a dynamic form of human relations, rather than a remnant of tradition. Following on from this, we highlight the increasingly global spread of caste and reflect on what happens to caste-based social relations when they traverse continents. In conclusion, we introduce the papers that make up this special issue. Taken together, they speak to changes in attitudes towards caste, but also the persistence of caste-based identities and dynamics in India and Britain. Even though the papers presented in this special issue work with the assumption of caste being a reality in and among the Indians, caste-like status hierarchies have existed in most, if not all, societies, and they continue to persist and intersect with other forms of differences/inequalities.

Institutionalizing Equality: Contexts and Meanings of Equal Opportunity Commission

The appointment of the Sachar Committee and mostly positive reception of its Report constitute an important event in the contemporary history of Indian democracy. Although it focused only on the development deficit among Indian Muslims, the wider acceptance of the Report also tells us something about the changing ideological and political currents in the country. It is in this context that we need to locate the proposal to set up the Equal Opportunity Commission (EOC). The paper ends with a few critical observations on the EOC Report and argues for a bolder approach towards the question of institutionalizing equality by going beyond the liberal idea of ‘equal opportunity’ and towards affirmative action.