Clinging to caste

Every so often during the two years I lived in Delhi, the same elderly man would pass my window. He was frail and bent over, and he would ring a small bell as he walked down the alley between the houses. He wasn’t selling vegetables or offering to shine shoes, so no one really noticed him as he shuffled around the corner. But to him, what he was doing was vital: by ringing his bell, he warned high caste Hindus that an untouchable was among them.

This medieval gesture went mostly unnoticed by the busy Delhiites who charged past him, blaring into their I-phones. Those who did see him would probably not have understood what he was doing, as this extreme form of caste identity is rarely seen. Nevertheless caste remains a brutal fact of life in India. There is no mobility either up or down its strict hierarchy, from which death or reincarnation is the only escape. Caste is a badge worn even by those who deny it and in decisions such as marriage it often used as a veto.

The caste system is not just a bizarre phenomenon restricted to India. It is alive and well among many Indian communities in Britain, as Amardeep Begraj and her husband Vijay found ealier this month. Their case does not sound unfamiliar. I have a Sikh friend who claims, for instance, to be a “farmer.”  He neither has the hands nor the footwear of an agricultural worker. But to him, this is mere detail. He holds fervently to his designation as a “jat”. He believes that God has put him on this earth to grow potatoes, milk cows and use red diesel, despite the fact he has never seen a farm in his life and spends most of his days as a surgeon in a Midlands hospital.

His loyalty to his caste identity was strong enough for him not to see past it when it came to marriage. His marriage, an arranged one, pivoted on the caste of his prospective bride—only a fellow “jat” would be tolerated. In fact, of the eight Indian weddings I have been to in Britain in the last two years, seven of them were between people of the same caste. The one that wasn’t faced a barrage of complaints, boycotts and suspicious looks.

Unfamiliarity with Britain and its customs would be a reasonable defence for people who still cling to the caste system. Yet it is often the well-educated who uphold it most strongly. They have made a considered and active decision to claim their caste identity, along with the prejudices it entails. They have a real (and, for some, proud) awareness of where they fit in the hierarchy and who is beneath them, making the young followers of caste here in Britain as rigid in their social judgements as their medieval Indian ancestors.

Integration does not stop at knowing English or holding a passport. It requires the wholesale abandonment of a previous identity in favour of a current one. And as harsh as this sounds, it is the only way. Holding fragments of an ancestral identity can be dangerous, especially if they are as hurtful and divisive as caste.