Caste and Capitalism (Understanding India 5)

27 06 2007

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As this column argued last week, caste has been the historically specific form for expressing class division in the social formation of pre-modern, feudal South Asia. In its form of Jati, it developed parallel to the establishment of the specifically South Asian form of feudalism and received a detailed legal and ideological foundation in the Manusmriti texts compiled about a millennium and half ago.

Each caste was composed of people who were confined to a clearly defined work or occupation and each caste was placed either superior to or in subordination to other castes. Since each caste was linked to a particular work or occupation, it was not possible for social life to continue without the economic cooperation of all castes with each other, even though there were fairly severe restrictions on their social interaction. This reduced the ability of the direct producers – Shudras and the outcastes – to combine in large numbers to oppose oppression or persecution. Therefore, as was mentioned last week, one of the typical forms of lower class revolt in South Asia in pre-modern times has been migration. Read the rest of this entry »


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Categories : History, India - Pakistan, Marxism and Marxists, Politics, The Post Column

Caste (Understanding India 4)

20 06 2007

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Caste is perhaps the social institution so uniquely associated with South Asia for the past millennium and more. Caste is the English word, derived from the Portuguese, to denote social hierarchy in South Asia. It refers to both Varna and Jati, as these are known in local languages. The Varna system became universal in South Asia approximately 2,500 years ago, while the Jatis were given official sanction only with the legal code of Manu about a thousand and more years after the Varna system had become entrenched. Read the rest of this entry »


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Categories : History, India - Pakistan, The Post Column

The Importance of Class in Understanding India (3)

16 06 2007

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Just as geography is a visible yet unobserved presence in the story of our past and present, we cannot live a moment without class – the social expression of economic relations of production – impinging on our reality. Yet, more often than not, it is either ignored or denied its rightful role in historical explanations. Read the rest of this entry »


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Categories : History, India - Pakistan, Marxism and Marxists, Politics, The Post Column

The Geography of our History (Understanding India 2)

6 06 2007

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The geographical region known historically as India and now by the more politically correct ‘South Asia’, is often referred to as a sub-continent. While it is not really very large in area compared to other continental countries, with its range of climates, topographies and physical insulation, South Asia has an exceptional geography. Surprisingly though, geography has been as ignored in the writing of Indian history as it has been in the understanding of its present. Read the rest of this entry »


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Categories : History, India - Pakistan, Politics, The Post Column

Soap Opera View of History (Understanding India 1)

1 06 2007

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One of the greatest impediments to peace in our region is the skewed understanding of history that we generally carry in our heads. Popular understanding seems preponderantly skewed in favour of understanding India’s history in terms of individual rulers and leaders or in categories of Hindu and Muslim. We perceive our past in terms of either great deeds done by equally great men (and notice that these are always men, usually great, but also often its opposite, evil) or in terms of the Hindus and the Muslims playing out a historical soap opera of epic proportions. Read the rest of this entry »


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Categories : History, India - Pakistan, Pop goes the Culture, Religion, Secularism, Secularisation, The Post Column

Failure as an orphan of success

11 04 2007

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If my column last week had spoken about the importance Marx gave to freedom of thought and expression, it is also necessary to answer why he supported the idea of “Dictatorship of the Proletariat” (proletariat = working class). Does not this idea of “dictatorship” of the working class negate individual freedom? In fact, most critics of Marxism identify this concept of “Dictatorship of the Proletariat” as the root of the authoritarianism and totalitarianism of communist societies. Read the rest of this entry »


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Categories : History, Marxism and Marxists, Politics, The Post Column

That Faustian bargain with the characterless monster of unfreedom

4 04 2007

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In his famous book, The Gulag Archipelago, Alexander Solzhenitsyn speaks of a function to praise Stalin where everyone got up and started clapping after the tribute was read out. The clapping went on, as no one wanted to be the first to stop. No one dared, as the secret police was watching to see who would quit first. This was their way of identifying who the independent-minded people were. Finally, after more than 10 minutes of unceasing applause, the director of the factory where the function was being organised stopped clapping and sat down. As if on cue, the entire congregation stopped clapping and sat down. Solzhenitsyn goes on to say that the director was arrested that same night.

While Solzhenitsyn has been dismissed by supporters of the Soviet Union as a Western agent, this account seems believable because there are so many other, more objective, records of the lack of freedom of thought and expression in the Soviet Union and other communist states. Read the rest of this entry »


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Categories : History, Marxism and Marxists, Politics, The Post Column

Pulling down the Vendome Column

28 03 2007

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On this day (28 March), in 1871 the citizens of Paris proclaimed the first socialist government of this world. The Paris Commune, as it came to be called, was an epoch making effort by the workers and middle classes of Paris to build a new form of government which would be democratic, just and transcend the narrow walls of nationalism.

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Categories : History, Marxism and Marxists, Mobilisation and Movements, Politics, The Post Column

Are men and women equal? Part II

7 03 2007

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(The first part of this article can be seen here)

This column ended last week by arguing that women’s struggle for equality cannot be fought independent of the larger struggle for human equality. Does that imply that an independent women’s movement is not desirable? That it could actually be self-defeating in the longer run? Would celebrating the International Women’s Day (which falls tomorrow) split the unity required to struggle for human emancipation by disconnecting women’s issues from larger concerns? Read the rest of this entry »


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Categories : History, Marxism and Marxists, Mobilisation and Movements, Politics, The Post Column, Wo/Men, Feminism, Gender

Women’s Day, Lenin and a riot in Copenhagen

6 03 2007

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Newspapers for the past few days have been carrying reports of riots and firefights between anarchist squatters and police in Copenhagen, Denmark over control of a 19th century building now called the Ungdomshuset or “youth house”. It appears that this municipal building was given to young people in the 1970s and since then has been the site for a vibrant “alternative” youth culture in Copenhagen.

The Guardian makes a brief mention of the fact that this building was constructed by the Danish labour movement in the last years of the 19th century and hosted Vladimir Lenin. We’ll come to that later, but what is most interesting, ironic even, for me is that two days before International Women’s Day the building where this idea was first conceived is being pulled down. Read the rest of this entry »


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Categories : History, Marxism and Marxists, Politics, Pop goes the Culture, Wo/Men, Feminism, Gender

Are men and women equal?

28 02 2007

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This is perhaps one of the defining questions of the modern world.

Irrespective of the country and culture one lives in, it is next to impossible to negotiate life today without running into this question lurking behind office desks, popping out of the messy bed sheets, and mixing with the food on our plate. How we ask and answer this question marks our politics, paints our ideology, highlights our socio-cultural context as well as gives hints about how we live our private lives.

So I might as well ask and answer this question, even though I can hear Alexander Pope whispering in my ear: “For fools rush in where angels fear to tread”! Read the rest of this entry »


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Categories : History, Politics, The Post Column, Wo/Men, Feminism, Gender

Left Writing Pakistan…

25 02 2007

The following are a random collection of posts relating to Pakistan from different debates I have been part of on Orkut in the past few months. Read the rest of this entry »


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Categories : History, India - Pakistan, Politics, Religion, Secularism, Secularisation

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