This takes us back to those ancient civilisations, where the profession of a person used to determine his cast. And he was free to change it whenever he wanted. 'Cast' - the word was neither a weapon of politics nor a prestige symbol, it was functional and helped people in their profession. But, everything wasn't perfect. Money and power has always been our weakness, and many of the people who were 'Bramhans' or Bramhins, were no exceptions. They started enjoying their life which gave them respect without having to do any hard labour. Not to forget it used to earn them money too.
These 'Bramhans' became insecure about them losing such comforts in life, so they started 'protecting' their caste and declared that Bramhans can only marry Bramhans and no other castes would be acceptable. And this was the start of what we see today as 'Casteism' and the castes were gradually converted to classes, though we still call them casts!
According to Marx, the lower classes tend to follow the upper classes in order to achieve respect and dignity, which gives rise to class control.
Now, all the other castes confined themselves to marrying their own members. And very soon, the demarcations evolved strongly and started dividing the society into many small groups. And the power struggle started.
What we see today is the extreme form of 'casteism', which has become orthodox to a large extent.
This leads me to many observations I have been trying to note since last year, which include 'culture' and ' traditions', I'm really sorry if you would find this portion offensive.
We, Indians, are confused. We want to follow the west, want to live like they do and do not want to accept that problems are imbibed in us. Yeah, we talk about our culture, and relish talking about how great Indian cuisine is, or, for that matter, how proud we are to be Indians. But all of this is serious misconception, which has been put into our minds by our society which sadly and blindly overlooks all the problems in India. Cast system and religion are two big problems India faces today. Adding to this list are numerous others like corruption, poverty, attitude, mentality and lack of will power.
We are a big bunch of unemployed youth, who has opportunities but is too choosy to work, because there is something wrong with the education system. We have so many things to blame for India being a backward country although our culture is excellent and we are superior than those Americans and Australians. And the latter, the Australians, are so dumb that the Indian students excel at everything they do (in Australia), but sadly have no personality, because they were bred in the worst education system a country can ever adopt. (Pun Intended)
'We are the best', the administration of MIC believes, is also believed by everyone in India. Every individual thinks that their 'culture' is superior to its western counterpart. But this term - 'culture' is exceptionally vague and people use it at their own convenience - for beating up girls at a pub in Mangalore or asking girls in Kanpur to avoid wearing Jeans. But this doesn't apply when they secretly store huge amounts of black and illegally earned money in safe lockers of Swiss banks. This is a different issue, they say, I believe!
I think all of us Indians have to rethink how we judge things and what are the parameters used. We should also rethink and try and figure out what is actually Indian culture, one that is seen at Kahjuraho or the text in Manusmriti. We should also think about how we all belong to a country and Maharashtra is no exception and is part of India and finally, what can be done with people like Raj Thakarey, Mamata Banarjee, Bal Thakarey, Mayawati, Narendra Modi, Lalu Prasad, Varun Gandhi and the RSS.
Nice example of how mind can wander anywhere at virtually no time. :)
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