Description
Has globalisation made India ‘casteless’? The term ‘castelessness’ is associated with the modern savarna classes in the Indian society using which they claim to disregard their association with the caste system. This paper will study the puzzle if globalisation has diluted the caste system in India. The period of this paper would be predominantly post-1991. Two concepts of globalisation would be explored- as a process and as an ideology.
The ‘casteless’ Indian market as created due to capitalism and neoliberalism brought by globalistion would be kept parallel to ‘casteless’ savarnas in order to understand the perception and reality of the caste system. The term ‘casteless’ savarnas hence, becomes an oxymoron through which the position of the Indian state would be understood. Concepts like modernity would also be problematized which could not end the age old practice of caste system in India. In fact, several state institutions like the Army, schools, etc. and other institutions like culture and religion have been propagating the caste system in different ways. Hence, the ‘New India’ and the ‘India Shining’, although they claim India to be casteless and modern, the whole story still needs to be told. This paper aims to tell this story.
