REFRAMING CASTE: A DECOLONIAL LENS ON INDIA’S SOCIAL STRUCTURE

Abstract

The research highlights the importance of epistemology, a branch of knowledge which explains how do we know things that we know. Our knowledge about the social structure or caste system in India is dependent on the Orientalist scholarship of 19^th century. Therefore, our knowledge regarding caste system remains confined to the orientalist perspective and we start to perceive our own scriptures from a blinkered vision. The absence of a decolonial lens restricts one to understand the merits, timeframe and other nitty-gritties of the caste system. The study adopts an analytical approach while placing reliance on primary sources (Wherever needed) & also some much-overlooked scholarship which is factually robust. This research attempts to present a decolonial (and not post-colonial) outlook to understand caste, varna and jati, how they differ and if they differ what is the difference between them. The attempt here is to understand Caste as it exists today and the colonial interventions that changed the epistemological view towards Varna and Jati. The main purpose is to apply an inter-disciplinary approach between “Coloniality; Civilization & Constitution” to offer a probable solution to the caste discourse. A framework based on analytical reasoning with more reliance on extracts and citations will be used in order to have factual clarity, with connecting the dots in order to arrive at an objective conclusion. The Goal is understanding the as to how did Varna and Jati culminated in Caste due to colonial influences; Definitions defines any concept, if the foundation of a structure is flawed the structure results in chaos, and to address this issue is the theme of the paper.