Caste Discrimination In India

2503 Words11 Pages
"Change is one thing. Acceptance is another" Change took place in our nation long back in 1947 when India got independence from the colonial powers, but have we accepted the change yet? Caste Discrimination is a taboo or a “no-no” topic of discussion on official papers, but it is still followed in various parts of the country. One cannot blatantly blame the Northern part of the country for caste discrimination, as literacy rates are low, as prejudice on the basis of caste is not something that education can eradicate rather it is a game of the predominant ideology that has been followed since centuries. To trace the origins of Caste system, it was a system developed on the basis of occupation. As per the Hindu scriptures, there…show more content…
Many citizens converted from Hinduism to Christianity, as a solution of the caste discrimination that they faced previously, but then again the ideological acceptance from the society was hard to achieve. The missionary Christian culture appealed to many people who were victims of caste discrimination, and they chose to convert as the new religion promised to give them an identity that would treat them as an equal in the society and thus, they opted for conversion. But whether they indeed got the recognition that was promised to them was the question which was left unanswered? The missionaries built schools for the people who converted to Christianity from various lower castes. In the book, Untouchable by Mulk Raj Anand, the protagonist, Bakha, after his day long process of humiliation, finds comfort when he talks to the white officer as he treats him like an equal and does not remind him of his caste disparity with the others in the his society. This was one of the reasons why many people from the lower castes chose the option of converting into religions like Islam or…show more content…
The novel talks about “Love Laws”, religion, caste politics, but above all it caters to the idea of how small things affect big changes in totality. The society being portrayed in the book acts as a microcosm of the world. One has to notice the small details that the author is trying to provide us, while reading the book and this has been achieved by the author by using an innocent perspective for the novel. The instances like Rahel’s watch that literally tried to freeze time, the little Marxist Flags or Estha’s “Two Thoughts”, all have been compiled in a very moving manner (TILAK, SHANTANU) . The social order, in which the novel has been set up, was one with a lot of political upheaval. Amongst such a set up for the plot, one of the protagonists Velutha, the “god” of small things, is an untouchable, though a very talented outcaste. Despite Velutha’s talent he is does not get the deserved recognition, because he has the disgrace of untouchability attached to his existence, which is difficult for the so called touchable or the upper caste to digest. Arundhati Roy here is trying to poke a finger in the eyes of her readers and make them realize that caste discrimination is just an ideological battle that the upper castes do not want to let go off. Here the person’s occupational talent is of no value, where as the origins of caste system was an occupational divide. Such is the irony. A dalit

More about Caste Discrimination In India

Open Document