4 Political sociology in the Indian Context

Sophia Abbas

INTRODUCTION

Political sociology in India emerged after India gained independence and became a democratic republic. For the disciplines in the social sciences, especially political science and sociology, such a transformation made necessary the need to not only understand the functioning of modern political institutions, but also how the traditional social base of Indian society would function within such modern political system. It is this particular emphasis on the social in the understanding of the political in India that gives rise to the discipline of political sociology. In the period after Independence a number of sociologists and social scientists sought to understand the changing social context of political behaviour in India. It is this inter-disciplinary terrain of the interface between the political and the social that resulted in the need for a separate discipline of political sociology. However, this neither reduced the relevance of sociology nor of political science as political sociology developed as a sub-discipline of sociology, notwithstanding the fact that both are closely inter-related. Dipankar Gupta (1996) provides an excellent understanding for the development of Political Sociology in India. His book gives us a clear idea on the social and political conditions that prevailed before and after independence and how the modern principles that were adopted after independence managed to survive along with the traditional ones that already existed.

Before considering the deeper concerns of political sociology in India, it would be useful to have a look at the basic features of this discipline. An important point to be discussed here is how political sociology is different from the discipline of political science. The most broad and widely accepted understanding of political science is that it deals with power. What is important here to look at however, is the difference between power and authority as developed by Max Weber. According to Weber, power is “the ability of an individual or group to achieve their own goals or aims when others are trying to prevent them from realising them” and domination (authority) is “the probability that certain specific command (or all commands) will be obeyed by a given group of persons” (Weber, 1968). The willingness of those who are being ruled to subject themselves to the ruler is not important when we study power whereas this is the core idea used in studying authority. It is this legitimacy of power that the political sociologists are interested in. “While politics concerns itself with power in the broadest sense of the term, political sociology, is really interested in authority, i. e. , in legitimate power (Gupta, 1996).

According to Gupta, “Weber’s distinction between power and authority, at one stroke, provided the key concepts for political sociology, as well as cleared the field for the growth of this specialization” (Gupta, 1996).

This module will consider the development of political sociology in India in the following parts: In section one we look at how political sociology constructs its object of inquiry by focussing on the contradictory relationship that exists between the practitioners of caste and their inclusion in a modern political system. In section two, we look at how political sociology engages with processes and movements that deal with the category of caste as it operates in a modern political system. Finally in section three, we look at how political sociology deals with other social groups within the political spectrum but who inhabit a space that is outside the caste-system.

Section- I

THE CONTEXT OF MODERNIZATION, DEMOCRACY AND CONSTITUTIONALISM

The political and social situation before and after India got independence in 1947 needs a special reference in understanding the emergence of political sociology in India. The basic framework on which the discipline constructs its understanding of power and its organization is by foregrounding the principle contradiction of the existence of the caste-system in a society that professes to be a modern, democratic republic. The caste-system was structurally embedded in a hierarchical system based on birth, rooted in privilege, and which sanctioned both discrimination and exclusion among the diverse groups and sub-groups of the Indian population. The hierarchical division of people based on birth and occupation clearly represented a system of inequality that pervaded the entire universe of social relationships that make up Indian society. After independence, India adopted its constitution which declared it to be a socialist democratic society which gave equal rights to all citizens irrespective of their caste, religion, language etc. Thus, on the one hand, there was the traditional Indian caste system which upheld a set of power relations that were both asymmetrical and discriminatory and on the other hand, there was the adoption of a modern political constitutional system based on principles of equality, liberty, human dignity, secularism etc. It is this juxtaposition of the traditional and the modern in the sphere of Indian politics that serves as the principal site of contradiction on which political sociology as a discipline has sought to develop its inquiry and knowledge base. Political sociologists in India were interested in the interaction between these two sets of principles. What was interesting is the co-existence of these contradictory set of principles without either of them facing complete demise. “In their (political sociologists’) view this was possible because tradition was moulded and transformed in a uniquely symbiotic way to aid the cause of political and social modernization of India” (Gupta, 1996). This unique political and social situation in India could not be accommodated under the theories of political sociology which already existed and this was the background in which political sociology as a separate discipline emerged. It is based on this very situation Dipankar Gupta argued that “the phrase political sociology in India is more appropriate than political sociology of India” (Gupta, 1996).

This unique feature of the Indian political system invited attention of many scholars from a host of different disciplines all of them writing under the broad disciplinary field of political sociology. While some of them looked at the co-existence of traditional and modern principles/ values etc., some others looked at how such a contradiction affected the process of developing a modern political system in India. Yet others looked at looked at how these two contradictory spheres of political life i.e., the modern and the traditional complemented each other despite the incompatibility of the values espoused in either of them.

Rudolf and Rudolf looked at how the caste system, instead of working against the democratic principles of a modern political system, changed their form in terms of how caste groupings became political groupings. If caste groupings were understood as solidarities that functioned under certain hierarchical caste identities, within the modern political system, these caste solidarities transform themselves especially within the domain of political mobilisation to function as interest groups within a larger political configuration. It is important to note that within such transformations only the form underwent a change, while the substance of caste in its hierarchical nature remained intact. What the Rudolph’s emphasized here was the persistent centricism of the Indian political system. The factors that supported the existence of such centrist politics to prevail included the marginality of class politics, the fragmentation of the majority, the electoral strength of the disadvantaged sections, the increasing political consciousness of people and the constraints on the federal system due to social pluralism and cultural diversity (Rudolf and Rudolf, 1987). They also point out that since India’s electoral system is

based on First-Past-The-Post in which the candidate who manages to get the highest number of votes is declared the winner. Hence political parties have to appeal to people from all across different castes or religions rather than restricting themselves to any one particular community. Such political mobilizations would aim to get maximum number of votes keeping in mind the electoral strength of different caste groupings. Another interesting feature of Indian politics is the ‘group identity’ shared by different minority communities based on their common economic, social and cultural conditions. It is these identities which help them in strengthening their political participation. The role of identity be it caste or minority has played an important role in shaping the majority and minority discourse within political sociology. Equally important is the way in which the inequalities of the system are negotiated within the political system.

Section –II

NEGOTIATING CASTE INEQUALITIES

In 1957, the Balwant Rai Mehta committee appointed by the Government of India submitted its report which recommended the establishment of the Panchayati Raj or institutions for ‘democratic decentralisation’, which was accepted by the National Development Council in 1958. This led to the creation of new political structures based on democratic principles. Beteille has studied the effects of these new institutions on the relation between different caste groupings in Tamil Nadu. Before the coming of the Panchayati Raj institutions, upper caste, who are a minority in terms of population, dominated the other lower caste and Dalits. However, this situation has changed. Though they still manage to regain their economic and ritual dominance, they lost their political dominance to the non-Brahmins as they are very few in numbers. Thus Beteilleobserves that the introduction of new political structures and specialised political organs have helped the non-Brahmin leaders to come to power (Beteille, 1970). He observes the dual effect of political process on the caste system. On the one hand, by exploiting caste or sub-caste loyalties, the traditional structure based on caste system remains unchanged, on the other hand, new alliances are formed cutting across caste loyalties and this leads to the loosening of traditional structure. Frankel and Rao (1989) in their work on the caste system also discuss the issue of dominance to identify the role that dominant caste and dominant caste alliances pay within the modern political system. Across Indian in the different regions dominant caste who may not be from the upper caste but who have achieved material prosperity through the social and economic processes of transformation taking place in the country have played a significant role in shaping the culture of democratic politics within modern Indian society. The case of the Marathas in Western India and that of the Yadavs in Norther India is a case in point that illustrated the role of dominance played by these castes within the modern political system.

Rajni Kothari (1970) has tried to show how various caste groups and caste alliances have engaged with the modern political system such that they can extract the benefit of their positions and numbers both from within the traditional caste-system as well as that of the modern democratic system. The idea of caste functioning as interests groups within a range of diverse political formations in the modern context has shown how important the caste identity still is within the electoral process of democratic politics. He says that there was never a complete polarisation between the caste system and the political system and that the contemporary process is a shift in social priorities rather than a total shift from one system to another. He says that “those in India who complain of ‘casteism in politics are really looking for a sort of politics which has no basis in society” (Kothari, 1970). So deeply had the consciousness of caste infiltrated the modern political system in India that it was not possible to talk about India’s democratic polity without at the same time talking about the role of caste in the shaping of this polity.

Protective Discrimination

In a caste ridden society like India, to follow the principles of equality and social justice at the same time without making some compromises is not possible. It is because of the deeply entrenched inequality which was the result of the caste system. At the time of framing of the Constitution, it was necessary to frame provisions keeping in mind the already existing inequality in the society. As a result, India adopted a policy of protective discrimination under which it was decided to give reservations to the disadvantaged groups in the fields of education, government jobs etc. so that they get a fair chance to compete with others and enjoy their rights. Galanter identified three types of preferences given to the reserved category: (i) Reservations to certain positions and for certain resources, for instance in the legislatures, government jobs and colleges. (ii) Provisions for them including expenditure on scholarships and loans etc. (iii) Special protections to protect them from getting exploited (Galanter, 1978). As the disadvantaged groups were the lower castes, naturally the reservations were given on the basis of castes. This was extended to the Other Backward Castes who were identified in terms of the extent and nature of their backwardness. This in turn gave rise to an increase in the number of caste associations whose aim was to bring their respective castes under the policy of protective discrimination. “The Backward Classes too found their own identity as separate from the other Scheduled Castes” (Frankfel and Rao, 1989). As a result of these developments, the membership in a caste association became an achieved one unlike caste membership which was ascribed by birth. Rudolf and Rudolf have pointed out how party programmes may lead to splits within a caste and alliances across other castes (Rudolf and Rudolf, 1987).

Anti-Reservation Movements

A major development in the political situation of India was the anti-reservation movements. In 1980 the Mandal Commission submitted its report in which it justified the already existing reservations for SCand ST and recommended 27% reservation for the OBC which resulted in an increase in the reserved quota from 27% to 50%. This was followed by wide protests, popularly known as Anti-Mandal Protests of 1990. The protests were against giving reservation on caste basis and not on merit basis. This led to the resignation of then Prime Minister V. P. Singh, who decided to implement the Mandal Commission recommendations. Many cases of self-immolation by students were also reported.

A major problem that exists even today is that the status of a caste is not uniform throughout the country. Galanter has pointed out that there were castes which were considered untouchable in some parts and had a better status in some other parts. For example, the Dhobis who were untouchables in UP but not in Bombay (Galanter, 1978).

Though caste played a prominent role in the way politics worked in India, there were many other factors also which were important. India faced many other disturbances other than the anti-reservation movements and these need a brief mention.

Section- III

INTERNAL PROCESSESS/ POLICIES THAT CONTINUE TO EFFECT THE INDIAN POLITY

The image of India being successfully governed by modern political institutions soon began to face tensions in different parts of the country. Regional disturbances on the basis of region, religion, language etc. started to spring up in different parts of the country continuing to cause a huge amount tensions on the federal nature of the Indian polity. Similarly secessionist movements like those in Khalistan, Jammu and Kashmir and regions of North-East India also created a huge amount of conflict, loss of life and property to the sections of Indian population inhabiting these regions.

Similarly, the political sociologists have also looked at various conflicts that have emerged in the decades following independence that emphasize the politics of majority and minority upholding the secular principles of the Indian Constitution has often been a difficult project fraught with tensions and conflict. One of the failures of modern political system can be seen in the widespread communal conflicts that have been occurred in India. The partition in India is the best example of this. Even after independence, the tensions between both communities continued and one significant example is the 1969 Gujarat Riots. In 1992, another major incident took place which was the demolition of Babri Masjid in Ayodhya. These are only some instances. Many similar incidents took place and still take place which stand as a serious threat to the secular India.

AtulKohli after studying different states identified four different factors which played a major role in the crisis situation in the Indian political scenario: “(i) the deinstitutionalizing role of national and regional leaders; (ii) the impact of weak political parties; (iii) the undisciplined political mobilisation of various caste, ethnic, religious and other types of groups; and (iv) the increasing conflict between the haves and have nots in the civil society” (Kohli, 1990). Many saw Indira Gandhi’s style of governance as the cause for the crisis but there was more to it and this was a major question on Indian politics that invited the attention of political sociologists. “Kohli himself suggests that part of the answer may be in the hiatus between the haves and the have notes which has continued to grow in contemporary India” (1990).

Failure of the State:

Many have criticized the Indian state for the ways in which it tried to unite different sections of Indian population who were culturally different. “Kothari notes that it is important not to talk simply of crisis of governance but to realize how the myriad diversities in India have been undermined and their interests stifled for the sake of unity at the centre” (Kothari, 1970). The State, though claimed to be a protector of everyone, in reality favoured the urban elites and this led to a furthering of the inequality that already persisted.

An exception to this failure of the State, as observed by Atul Kohli, is that of West Bengal. “This government is characterized by a coherent leadership, an ideological commitment to exclude the propertied classes from direct participation in the governance of the state, by a pragmatic attitude to the entrepreneurial classes which are non-threatening in character to the political authorities, as well as by a party and political organizational apparatus that is both centralized and decentralized” (Kohli, 1990).

With many protests happening against different policies of government, a major question that demanded answer was the legitimacy of the government. “The changing political scenario of India in recent decades, especially after 1975, made the question of legitimacy a very important area of investigation” (Gupta, 1996). Political sociologists who were primarily interested in the legitimacy of the ruling party naturally gave attention to such anti-government feelings. A major incident that swiftly changed a legitimate ruling party/ruler into an illegitimate one was the Emergency of 1975 declared by the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. The Emergency clearly revealed the dictatorial tendencies in the ruling class and the weakness of state institutions within the modern political context. Yet, even in this very dark period of Indian politics it is useful to note that when elections were announced the Congress was defeated and the Constitution amended to prevent the imposition of Emergency rule by any future government. The Emergency period was followed by a change in the government but unrests continued to occur. In order to get a complete picture of the political situations in India, it is necessary to look at the different types of protests/ movements that took place.

Ethnic Movements:

An important feature of Indian polity that attracted the attention of many political sociologists in India is the repeated occurrences of ethnic movements. Here it is important to look at what is actually meant by ethnicity. According to T. K. Oommen, ethnicity arises when the link between culture and territory is broken (Oommen, 1997). He sees citizenship as a solution to the ethnic tensions and as a means to equality. India being a land of diverse cultures, the chances for the occurrence of ethnic movements remain high. When an ethnic tension occurs it comes with an attempt by one group to mark another group as not belonging to their society as an outsider.

Linguistic, Nativist and Regional Movements:

Considering the diversity of Indian population, many were sceptical of the success of India as a nation. The Partition, in a way, confirmed this doubt. However the aftermath of Partition saw some positive changes. There was more tolerance from the sides of both the State as well as the people. Dipankar Gupta identified three different types of movements that marked the post-independence period. These were (i) Linguistic movements (ii) Nativist movements (iii) Regional movements.

1950s was marked by demands from different linguistic groups who wanted the states to be reorganised on the basis of language. This led to the formation of the State Reorganization Commission and subsequently, states were carved out on the basis of language. “The accession of unilingual provinces with the State Reorganization Commission brought about an end to these demands in the fifties, except in the case of Punjab where the issue was ultimately resolved in 1966” (Gupta, 1996).

In the 1960s and 70s India saw the emergence of nativist movements. This was by the natives or the ‘sons of the soil’ who demanded economic benefits and non-interference of people belonging to other linguistic groups in the local economy. One of the best ongoing example of this is the Shiv Sena movement which vehemently opposes the intrusion of people from other states to Maharashtra. Shiv Sena was founded by BalThackeray on 19 June 1966 and its members accuse the non – Marathis for taking over the opportunities which they see as rightfully belonging to the Marathis. In 1960, the Bombay Presidency was linguistically reorganised into two different states of Gujarat and Maharashtra. However in Maharashtra, most of the industries were owned by Gujarati speaking people and at the same time, many south Indians migrated here. It was in this backdrop that the Shiv Sena movement came into existence.

This phase was followed by the emergence of regional movements in the 1980s which were heavily politicised resulting in the formation of political parties. The Akali Dal, DMK etc. are examples of such politicization. Unlike linguistic and nativist movements which were in no way anti-national, the

regional movements were directed against the Centre. These groupings were demanding for economic welfare and were not primarily ethnic or cultural in nature. However, Gupta observes that the government at the centre tries to convert their regional and secular issues into ethnic and cultural ones. A good example for this is Punjab in 1980s. “The Punjab agitation which began with very secular demands, like Chandigarh, water redistribution and territorial demarcation, had over the years been ethnicized by the Centre to the extent that there was a time when Sikh extremists were seen to hold the key problem” (Gupta, 1996). For him, this attitude of the government, rather than the cultural differences, was the actual problem.

Closely linked to this was the agrarian crisis in Punjab and the Green Revolution. Though it was an initial success, its long term effects were not satisfactory. It increased the gap between rich and poor farmers as the costs of cultivation went up. This led to the process of de-peasantization of the peasantry, according to Vandana Shiva, as it was aimed at ‘building on the best’. Resources were allocated in favour of the rich farmers and even the subsidies introduced by the government reached the hands of them. The only option left to the small farmers were to resort to credit facilities and as getting an institutional credit was a long and difficult process, small farmers were forced to take non-institutional credit with exorbitant rates of interests and the result was them ending up in debt traps. In less than two decades after the Green Revolution, farmers in Punjab started feeling victimised. Vandana Shiva observed that since the policies related to the Green revolution were controlled by the Central government, the result was a conflict between the Punjab government and the Centre. She also says that the later developments including Sikh and anti-Sikh protests and a revival of the cultural identity of the Sikhs were more in response to the erosion of regional autonomy and the cultural and moral erosion of life in Punjab as a result of the Green Revolution and was not a cultural conflict of Sikhs with Hindus. However, the struggles of Sikh as farmers and as a religious community was rapidly communalized and militarized by the Centre (Vandana Shiva, 1992).

CONCLUSION

Political Sociology’s emergence in India was a result of the unique social conditions that prevailed here and the coming of modernisation and its effects on different sections of society. The caste system and the later developments after independence were significant events which provided rich materials for the political sociologists. Different movements that followed independence like ethnic, linguistic, nativist, regional, anti-reservation and farmers’ movements were all studied carefully under political sociology. The government was analysed on the basis of such movements. Whereas some saw such movements as a sign of crisis in governance of the Indian State, others saw it as its success. Another major development that got much attention was the proclamation of Emergency in 1975 by Indira Gandhi. The legitimacy her rule had before the Emergency period and its gradual decline were all interesting topics for the political sociologists in India. All these developments were very significant that there was the need and scope for a separate discipline and hence the emergence of political sociology in India.

REFERENCES

Beteille, Andre. Caste and Political Group Formation in Tamilnad, in Rajni Kothari (ed.) Caste in Indian Politics, Delhi: Orient Longman, 1970, pp 259-98.
Deshpande, Satish. 2015. “Reservations are not just about quotas” in The Hindu, 27 May, 2015.
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FURTHER READINGS:

Beteille, Andre. 1969. Castes: Old and New, Essays in Social Structure and Social Stratification, Asia Publishing House. Dasgupta, Samir. 2011. Political Sociology (ed.), Pearson Education.
Harish K. Puri, Paramjit S. Judge, Jagrup Singh Sekhon. 1999. Terrorism in Punjab: Understanding Grassroots Reality, Har-Anand Publications.
Noorani. A.G. 2014. Destruction of the Babri Masjid: A National Dishonour, Tulika Books.
Palmer, N.D. 1976. ‘India in 1975: Democracy in Eclipse’ in Asian Survey, vol 16 no. 2, pp. 95-110, University of California Press.
Roy, Shefali. 2014. Society and Politics in India: Understanding Political Sociology, Prentice-hall of India Pvt Ltd.
Shah, Ghanshyam. 1970. ‘Communal Riots in Gujarat: Report of a Preliminary Investigation’ in Economic and Political Weekly, vol. 5, No. 3/5, pp. 187-189+191+193+195+197-200.
Singh, Khushwant. 2013. The Anandpur Sahib Resolution and other Akali Demands, Oxford University Press.
Singh, Satinder. 1982. Khalistan: An Academic Analysis, Delhi and Punjab: Amar Prakashan.
Srinivas, M.N. 1962. Caste in Modern India and other essays, Asia Publishing House.
Srinivas, M.N. 1987. The Dominant Caste and Other Essays (ed.), Oxford University Press.