My first exposure to the 'The Caste System' as it prevailed in India was a chapter in the school history book, where I read about how it had been abolished by the endeavor of great men... Mahatama Gandhi and Baba Saheb Ambedkar amongst others. I grew up believing (rather was made to believe) that this evil was a thing of the past...that we as a society have evolved far too much for this system to permeate our daily life today.
I graduated from school to college and discovered what I learnt (at least as far as casteism in India was concerned) had been an illusion...a myth created by opinion leaders who'd much rather have the young generation see the world with rose tinted glasses and feel good about it rather than have reality stare them in the face. In a course in sociology at college, where the faculty did not believe in towing the line, the curriculum involved discussing life...real life...issues that people...in India were faced with....not the India you and I know...with its comfortable life in high rise apartments. We found ourselves talking about people living in the not so comfortable, not so urban India...dealing with casteism everyday...children not allowed to pursue an education...or even if they were fortunate enough to enter the precincts of a school, made to sit a few yards away from the children belonging to upper castes families....people not allowed to enter temples...or draw water from a well (to start with we would not think of depending on a well as a source of water but that’s a different issue altogether)....women burnt or slayed by their brother / father...her only crime...she married the person of her choice who happened to be a lower caste man...the brother – a murderer glorified by the village elders since he did what was termed by the media as 'honor killing'....killing somebody to protect the honor of the community. Moving out of college and moving on to work life...put these issues on the back burner in my mind. Not that these issues died a sudden death...I just found myself disconnected from these topics of discussions...work life brought with it new issues to think about.
My work took me to many towns ...big and small...in India...I could not help wonder how these towns have lost their character...with the advent of urbanization....it surprised me to see a UCB(United Colors of Benetton) in Ranchi...to see a signboard that said...opening shortly...SUBWAY....to hear that Indore (one can circumambulate the whole town in ten minutes) boasts of not 1 but 3 Coffee Day outlets. I had heard of the expression 'Any Town USA'...I was beginning to think the same about India...Any town I visited looked the same...the same shops, the same brands flashing as neon lights...I was (only) beginning to think that these billboards that symbolized the advent of MNCs were stretching the boundaries of what we call modern India...urban India - when I was reminded that what I saw was just a facade...beneath which ground reality had not changed much.
Categories: Wandering Around_ , Reflections_
