Caste System and Generational Poverty in India: Analysis

To what extent does the government and society of India perpetuate poverty among citizens?

Government and society can perpetuate poverty through sociocultural traditions and economic institutions. This is evident in a country like India where the government is taking action to eliminate poverty, but the socio-cultural tradition of the caste system is a deciding factor, which hinders the elimination of poverty. To perpetuate poverty means to keep it in existence and in India, this is shown through the caste system, which has an impact on the poverty and inequality rates. The caste system is a part of the Hindu religion that divides people into four different social classes, and the outside and lowest of these classes are known as Dalits or the untouchables. With almost over 200 million Indians being Dalits it makes it very difficult to completely eradicate poverty. With India being a developing country they have adopted the Millennium Development Goals, which is one of the aspirational goals being eliminating poverty. India has successfully achieved “having 60% of its people living on less than $1.25 a day to 42%” in 2005. Also, it is important to acknowledge that the caste system was annulled when India gained independence in 1947 but it is still strongly a part of the sociocultural traditions of India due to no enforcement. Although the government has created reparations for Dalits this does not eliminate society's strong view on the caste system, which does not help the process of eliminating poverty. This is an important factor when accessing India’s development since development is about creating a sustained standard of living in a society but instead, it has created a lack of equity in society.

The caste system has kept the lower caste of India in generational poverty as you are born into the same caste your family is in, and those born into the Dalits are stuck there. Dalits specifically suffer because they have to perform tasks degrading to the higher castes such as cleaning human feces and this job will be then passed down to their children. This widely accepted prejudice determines these Dalit’s quality of life and what job opportunities they are allocated. If Dalits are receiving a poor education this creates a lack of opportunity for them in the future creating a repetitive cycle for the rest of their family. Poor education also makes it very difficult for Dalits to find better jobs once again impacting their standard of living. With the social sustainability of this caste being threatened, it is almost impossible for them to overcome the line of poverty.

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However, many Dalits convert to other religions such as Islam or Buddhism in hopes for better opportunities. The caste system is a part of the Hindu religion due to this job managers would reject people unless they converted to Hinduism, even though people needed a job they rather be unemployed than stripped of their religion. This aspect does not only limits their development but also violates their human rights, According to Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, humans have a goal of self-actualization but this is impossible to achieve without the basic needs of food and shelter to feel safe which these people stand a chance of losing without a job. If people are not able to attain a job due to their caste or religion how are they expected to get out of poverty? This creates a problem in society even though the government is making moves to better the lives of those in poverty.

Poverty is shaped by a combination of power resources and institutions[footnoteRef:8]; the Indian government controls both of these elements and thus they are able to have a significant impact on the lower castes and Dalits. As mentioned before the government has created reparations for Dalits to integrate them into society to improve their standard of living. With these special privileges, they are able to attend higher education as a limited amount of spots are secured for them. This causes a dispute among higher castes as it makes it more difficult for them to get into University showing their lack of consideration for the lower caste and Dalits. Thus showing the positionality of these higher castes and the government, the government is making these changes to increase Dalit’s opportunities but society is so embedded with the discrimination against them that they do not agree. Another view is that since this discrimination against Dalits starts from a young age, children from higher castes grow up with them out of sight. Since this does not impact their lives, they never stop to question their treatment or trying to help them. Therefore discrimination becomes almost second nature and the cycle continues. With this in place, it becomes very complicated to completely alleviate all poverty in India.

Even though the government has created some positive impacts for the poor they have also negatively impacted them. In the early 2000s, India underwent an economic boom that caused many new cities to be built which meant taking over farmland. Many farmers lost their livelihood to these new cities and factories being built. Losing land means that these farmers lose a source of income and food. False hope is also created as they are rejected to work in these new factories that had been built thus leaving farmers with no form of income. This can be seen as a form of structural violence as taking away farmland and not providing them with new jobs takes away from their human needs. From this example, it seems the government is valuing economic growth for the country more important then poverty for development improvement.

Another impact the government has on small-scale farmers is there lack of consideration and protection. Small-scale farmers are in huge competition with large-scale farmers and are unable to compete as resources to maintain the small farms are priced highly, around “41.9 percent of agricultural labor households are categorized as poor”. Farmers choose to sell their land to bring in income for their families but in turn, many commit suicide since they are still unable to provide for their families. This then negatively impacts India’s Human Development Index (HDI) and Gross Domestic Product (GDP). So, although India’s economy is growing it does not mean poverty is being reduced. It only indicates that the economy is constructed solely around the priorities of the government.

Additionally, the government contributes to the negative impact upon the lower castes through insufficient healthcare. India’s government only spends 5% of their GDP on health care, which results in poor services. The higher-quality health services are simply unaffordable for these low-income families. Health contributes to the economic progress of a country as the healthier your population the better your modes of production. However this is not the case in India, instead, these conditions facilitate the long-suffering of the lower caste and increase the inequality gap. Additionally, people in rural India do not have access to a pension due to the lack of paperwork for example no birth certificate to qualify and are declined.[footnoteRef:16] This can be viewed as a form of structural violence as there is no other action in place to help their situation. A pension is beneficial as it could help acquire better health services.

On a universal level, the United Nations have created development goals such as the MDGs that then evolved into the Sustainable development goals (SDGs) that India has adapted for the development for there own country, India has only met 4 out of the 12 targets set out in the MDGs and now there are 17 goals to be met with the SDGs. Even though both MDG and SDG are aspirational goals with no direct instructions on implementation in a specific country, a difference is that SDGs are now inter-governmental meaning it will take more policy execution, enforcement and supervision to be accomplished by 2030. This will be a difficult task when brought into India’s cultural context due to the caste system. The caste system was created to “promote the harmonious workings of society' but through corruption, it has become the discriminating system it is today, which has complicated the development of many Indians.

Globalization has also impacted poverty in India as it has led to an unequal distribution of benefits among urban and rural areas. This is due to the free markets that have been created and thus creating these large-scale farms that impose on the small-scale farmers. Globalization has also led to the awareness of how socially constructed poverty is in India when following the caste system. This progress that India is taking to becoming a developed county is not sustainable according to Cato’s model of the three pillars of sustainability since social and economic sustainability is being threatened. From a global standpoint, there is no justification as to regarding the social discrimination against the lower castes is a major issue as the caste system has become so internalized even though it's known to be historically wrong. For change to occur and poverty to be completely alleviated it will take many generations due to the deeply rooted discrimination against the lower caste.

In conclusion, it is evident that a major reason to why generational poverty occurs in India is due to the caste system being so dominant in society. This negatively impacts those of a lower caste, as they cannot attain any opportunities to alleviate themselves due to the discrimination, corruption of their farmland, poor health care, and globalization. Although the government has made progress in creating policies that prevent this there is still a lack of enforcement. Thus giving reason to why poverty among the lower caste is perpetuated and why it is extremely difficult to alleviate. Unless the change comes from a societal perspective those apart of the lower caste and Dalits will continue to suffer.

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