Caste System
National Geographic, June 2003
 India’s
caste system is perhaps
the world’s longest surviving
social hierarchy.
 Caste
encompasses a complex
ordering of social groups on the
basis of religious purity &
determined by birth!
The Aryans &
Dravidians
Before the Aryans settled in North
India- the Dravidians lived in India.
The Aryan’s pushed the Dravidians
further south in India & established
the Caste System as a “division of
labor”- with the Dravidians that
stayed at the lowest level- Shudras.
Manu established
the Caste System
The Division of Labor was a
good idea in the beginning
but over the course of time in
degenerated.
“Indeed the Greatest Curse
on Hinduism”
It has established racial
prejudices in India that still
exist today!
Over time a fifth caste- Dalits or Untouchables
Remember there are over 30,000 caste & sub castes!
Oppressive Caste System

No Social
Mobility..


Born into you caste
You cannot change your caste.
Hindus believe that your caste
level is a result of your karma
in a previous life.
Untouchables / Dalits
Cannot:

possess any wealth

get an education

enter a Hindu temple

drink from public wells/water systems

Marry outside their caste

Touch anyone from a higher caste!!

Argue or disobey upper caste demands.
Untouchables of India
National Geographic, June 2003
Untouchable Woman
A veiled woman of the Untouchable caste pauses for a photo while
sweeping outside her home. India's constitution forbids caste
discrimination and specifically abolishes Untouchability, but the
hierarchies and social codes of Hinduism perpetuate the system.
Entrenched Irony
Members of the Untouchable Dhobi caste beat the impurities out of clothes
on the banks of the Yamuna River in Delhi. Life's "unclean" tasks, such as
cleaning latrines and digging graves. They face a lifetime of discrimination
and brutality, prejudice that endures even though Untouchability is
officially banned by the Indian constitution.
Laundry Yard
Her fate scripted by Hindu law, an Untouchable girl can imagine little else
than working along the Yamuna River in Delhi as a Dhobi. Members of
this clothes-washing caste handle items 'polluted' by blood or human waste.
Untouchable Tanner
Upper caste aversion to
killing cattle, eating
beef, and handling
animal hides gives
Untouchables a
monopoly in the tanning
business.
A member of the
Chamar leatherworking
caste softens water
buffalo skin.
Planting Rice
Women from India's so-called Untouchable
caste plant rice in a large field., Untouchables
number some 160 million, about 15 percent of
India's people. Considered impure by Hindu
law, they are generally perform the most menial
jobs.
Brick Workers
For two dollars a day, Untouchable women load thousands of bricks at a
dust-choked kiln in Rajasthan. This job, while not restricted to unclean
castes, goes largely to Untouchables, their low status condemning them to
the most menial work.
Slums next to
modern buildings.
A luxury high-rise in Mumbai
stands aloof from a decaying housing
complex occupied by Untouchables.
Almost the only way
an Untouchable can
rise in Indian society
is to land a
government job or
university
scholarship, available
to a few under a
federal quota system.
Separate and Unequal
Across a narrow alley children on a stairway seek a stray breeze and
freedom from one-room apartments in a battered housing project for
Untouchables in Bangalore, in southern India. Jobs and the prospect of
fewer public humiliations at the hands of upper caste Indians bring many
Untouchables to the cities.
Water Rights
Across India members of upper castes often
refuse to share water with Untouchables,
convinced that any liquid will become polluted
if it comes in contact with an Untouchable.
Chicken Scraps
Discarded chicken scraps bought from a
restaurant barely make a meal for
Untouchables. These villagers belong to the
Musahar, or rat-eaters, caste, its members
known for hunting rodents. Musahar women,
No Choice
At age nine Kariamma was
dedicated by her family to
become a devadasi, or
"servant of God." At
puberty, like most devadasis
in India, she was offered
sexually to upper caste
patrons. Now, at age 30,
Kariamma has given birth
to five children, uncertain
of whom the fathers are.
Private Army
Outraged by the wage and land-reform demands
of Untouchables, the Ranvir Sena, a militia led
by landowners, has been implicated in the
massacres of more than 500 Untouchables. The
attackers have gone largely unpunished.
Disfigurement
It's hard to believe that
something good could
come out of the horror
that left Ramprasad, an
Untouchable, left, with
such disfiguring scars,
the result of a mob
dousing him and his
friend Ramlakhan with
acid for fishing in a
pond used by upper
caste villagers in Uttar
Pradesh, India..
Enlightenment
Untouchable women meeting in southern India focus on such issues as
literacy, malnourishment, and employment. An organization called
Janodaya, run by the Sisters of the Good Shepherd, educates women on
how to press for better government services in areas such as health and
education, and how to start small businesses.
Kasturba Balika School
School in New Delhi provides education to some
700 underprivileged girls, most of them
Untouchables. It is named for the wife of
Mahatma Gandhi, the man who fought and
Dr. B.R. Ambedkar

Overcoming numerous social and
financial obstacles, Ambedkar became
one of the first untouchable to obtain a
college education.

Dr. B.R. Ambedkar spent his whole
life fighting against social
discrimination of the caste system.
Poverty in India- directly
relates lower levels of caste