Kathryn Doner ’22: Casteism in the Indian bureaucracy
Greetings, I am Kathryn Doner! Welcome to my summer research blog where I would like to share with you what I have been researching for the last ten weeks! My summer research topic is casteism in the Indian bureaucracy. My faculty mentor is Dr. Trina Vithayathil of the Department of Global Studies.
If you are not familiar with caste, that is okay! In this blog, I hope to give you a general understanding of my research topic! If anything is unclear, please “Leave a Reply” below.
First and foremost, you may be wondering…
What is caste?
India’s caste system is a form of systematic inequality in Indian society. In the context of the United States, casteism can be comparable to racism. Caste plays a major role in all aspects of Indian society including careers, lifestyles, and how communities are treated. While privileged upper-caste individuals benefit from these inequalities, lower-caste Indians do not have access to the same opportunities as their elite counterparts. Members of lower-castes, therefore, struggle to advance and face extraordinary challenges because Indian society is infested with institutionalized discrimination.
The inequities between caste groups are extremely problematic because upper-caste Indians enable casteism to persist by not experiencing the discrimination that disadvantaged individuals encounter daily. The caste system is deeply rooted in India’s history which means that generational socialization shapes the perceptions of caste to create divisions. Moreover, caste is tied to Hinduism, the most practiced religion in India, which reinforces casteist customs and institutionalized discrimination. Like race, caste is a social construct that has been weaponized to reward the privileged at the expense of lower-caste communities.
Who experiences discrimination?
Many communities are susceptible to religious discrimination in India’s society. Unfortunately, religious minorities like Muslims, Christians, and Sikhs are most likely to endure discrimination and violence. Contrarily, I focused on groups within the Hindu community who are harassed because of their caste status. Specifically, lower-caste Indians and untouchables are often victims of discrimination. The three Hindu communities that I researched include Scheduled Castes (SCs), Scheduled Tribes (STs), and Other Backward Classes (OBCs).
Taking a step back from the context that I have provided, I want to explain the specifics of my summer research. Like I said above, many Indians experience discrimination and this was recognized by the newly independent Government of India in 1947. Policies of centralized affirmative action programs were implemented to help several discriminated communities. The form of affirmative action that I examined is the effect of reservation quotas on the caste composition of India’s administrative bureaucracy.
Now, what is the Indian administrative bureaucracy?
The Indian administrative bureaucracy is an institution in which civil servants govern the nation’s massive and diverse population. The administration operates on two levels, one being the Government of India and the other for the states. All employees collaborate with central government ministries and agencies to perform their roles within the meritocratic institution. Public civil servants are not elected but are tested and interviewed prior to extensive training.
In the scope of my summer research, I studied the caste composition of the Indian bureaucracy’s hierarchical organization to determine the adequacy of the representation of three disadvantaged populations. Like the caste hierarchy, the structure of the institution begins at the base with four tiers titled Group A, Group B, Group C, and Group D. The most senior posts are in Group A, while civil servants in Group D are responsible for lesser positions. The next level of the administrative bureaucracy after the four groups is the All-India Services (AIS) and central government ministries. Superior to the AIS and the ministries is the Secretariat and the Cabinet.
Also, what are reservation quotas?
Reservations provide lower-caste Indians with an opportunity to access more opportunities in higher education and positions within India’s bureaucracy to ensure that all of India’s populations are properly represented. In the case of my summer research, reservation quotas were intended to increase the representation of excluded caste communities in the civil services. Earlier, I mentioned that reservations for discriminated groups began in 1947 which is equivalent to seventy years of ongoing affirmative action to diversify the caste composition of India’s administrative bureaucracy.
I will investigate seventy years of the caste compositional trends in India’s central services to prove whether the representation of historically disadvantaged communities meets their prescribed reservation quotas. This longitudinal study also highlights factors supporting and hindering these compositional changes.
Did the seventy years of affirmative action lead to adequate representations of India’s diverse population?
Stay tuned to find out…read more.
