Racism and The Caste System in India
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The word “Racism” has been tossed around so carelessly and frequently, it has lost its meaning probably a long time ago. And there are a lot of people taking advantage of this. Take for example us Indians. We are probably the most hypocritical people when it comes to racism. Whenever there has been an attack on our community by others; be it Australians attacking Indians or the untouchability issue; we, as the poor victims, call the media, organize rallies, do everything we can to teach those “racists” a lesson on cultural tolerance. But have any of us never looked down upon anyone because he is from another caste/race. Just take a moment to think about it; if you were to fall in love with someone, would he/she more likely be a white or black or brown or red or oriental; would he/she be from your caste or the “soni” caste- one of the so-called upper caste or someone from the “Mochi” caste that people use to refer a one of the untouchable. And yeah this is all happening despite our historic "progress" in culture, science and technology.
As for some figures to shut the mouth of the omnipresent critics; Racism, Tribalism, and The Caste System have caused the death of over 62,000,000 people in the past 100 years. And these numbers is the lowest estimate since no data is available for the colonial period. And there are no estimates for people who have suffered or even tortured mentally/physically but not died and their predicament can be attributed to racism. Even the so called “Nationalistic Wars” for demanding a separate state/country have caused 12,000,000 refugees (current estimate) who have been displaces, their homes lost because of racism. These horrid figures should not a single trace of doubt about the terrible effects of these depraved ideologies.
But let us just focus on the cast system in India. There are a lot of people who don’t believe that the caste system counts as racism. Let’s have a look at what dictionary.com has to say:
Racism –noun A belief or doctrine that inherent differences among the various human races determine cultural or individual achievement, usually involving the idea that one's own race is superior and has the right to rule others.
And this is precisely what we have been doing for years. The whole caste system of India relies on one doctrine. ”Some castes are inherently higher than the others and they have the right to rule them.” But the fact that the racism in India remains one of the least challenged has contributed in escalating the seriousness of problem in more ways than we can imagine. The Indo-Aryans, who, the historians believe, came from Iran, started the Caste system in India, to preserve their ethnic purity and to prevent mixing up of what they called their Royal blood with the lower caste people they conquered. This is where the problem started. But by now the Caste system has become an integral and inherent part of Hinduism.
The Hindu name for the Caste system is Verna, which loosely translates to the color system. Darker-skinned people, the Dravidians, who were overpowered by the Aryans, became the Untouchables in the Verna system.According to the 1980 census of India, there were over 200,000,000 people who were considered of the lowest Castes. These people belonging to 200-300 Castes are often subject to very inhuman treatment based on the practices justified in the Hindu religious manual “Manu Smriti”. The property, honor and the very life of “Untouchables” remain threatened by those of the higher Castes.But we now live in the 21st century. And can we really continue living in a society like this? We have to ask this to ourselves. We know the solution to the problem but we won’t be able to do that unless we move out of our comfort zones and actually do what have to. The first step towards eradicating racism is Education. An educated a person is a lot more aware of others and the more one is aware of others the more he sees himself and the more respect he has for others.
The major problem is that racists have limited or no education or the experience increasing their understanding of other cultures. But trust me there is no way we can totally eradicate racism. People will always find something that differentiates themselves with the other groups (race, nationality, sexuality to name a few) .Just be open minded and just because you don't look, talk, act or sound like someone doesn't mean that you're better or worse. Remember: “The solution for most problems start at home.”
