Sebastian Velassery

Caste Identities and the Ideology of Exclusion Sebastian Velassery

Today, when India is certainly once more emerging as one of the most important social experiments in the world, it is more than ever incumbent to explore and re-discover the underlying reasons and philosophy that marginalized the Indian consciousness in terms of caste, ethnicity, religion and the like. This book is intentionally taking a re-look at caste as ontology in a deeper level by taking recourse to the major mode of dehumanization that has systematically happened in this country by upholding tradition as sacred and thus cannot be challenged. Unlike the European enlightenment which was powerful enough to overthrow a cognitive method that was centered on religious considerations, Indian cultural and civic movements could not depose doctrinal claims based on caste and caste identities. Therefore, the most significant question is: Can a new form of civic culture devoid of Varnashrama morals and their preceptors will be a possible reality in this tradition and culture? This is the most formidable, intellectual, cultural, political and social anxiety that post-independence India faces with regard to the humanization debates of Indian societies.