HISTORY OF CASTE IN INDIA - PAPERBACK

About the Book:-The caste system still exercises a tenacious hold on Hindu mind, though it is less tyrannical in its workings now. It has influenced the second largest community in India, the Muslims, too. In this handy book a Hindu scholar conducts a probe into the caste system, its origin, growth, its desirability, and possibilities for modifying or remodelling it in modern times. With this object in view, the author presents the evidence of the Laws of Manu on caste with his interpretations and comments on that evidence. The chapter headings will give an idea of the range and depth of the investigation: The Caste System (its definition, theory, psychology), History of India 250 B.C.– 250 A.D.), The Book Manava-Dharma-Shastra, Treatment of Caste by the Book (meaning of terms like Varna and jati, types of castes, the Four Varnas, occupational castes, possibility of changing one’s caste), Philosophy of Caste (philosophical theories and theory of purity) and Discrimination on Account of Varna (in questions of treatment at the court, taxation, inheritance, marriage and criminal law). Besides, there is an appendix in which the author talks about the radical defects of ethnology. This volume, which first appeared in 1909. About the Auhtor:- Shri Vyankatesh Bapuji Ketkar (2 February 1884 – 10 April 1937) was a sociologist, historian and novelist from Maharashtra, India. He is principally known as the chief editor of Maharashtriya Jnanakosha, the first-ever encyclopedia in the Marathi language. He was born in the city of Raipur in Madhya Pradesh, and was educated in Amravati and Wilson College, Bombay. He left for the United States in 1906 and obtained his PHD from Cornell University in 1911. After a year long sojourn in London (circa 1912) where he met his future wife Edith Kohn, he returned to India. His first appointment in India was as a Professor of Economics, Science of Administration and Universal Jurisprudence at Calcutta University