The Prevalence of Caste-religion mania in India- an Article.

Dear friends, 

I would like to share my views with you about the Caste& religion System that has deep-rooted in the life of Indians.
     The word "Caste", literally means -any of the hereditary social classes and subclasses of the societies. And “Religion” means- any practice that someone or some group is seriously devoted to. In fact these two things are meant for a general identity of the people, to identify one another (besides our religious worship). But, unfortunately, these two words matter more than 'identity' to us. Let me substantiate my views.
     Wherever we go, whomever we meet, whatever we do for our comfort we bother 'our caste or religion’, take them as an important consideration. Government has given reservation to certain backward class& caste people. Of course, that is undoubtedly for their welfare. But, we, in general, apply this 'caste& religion reservation' in education sector, job recruitment, politics, marriage proposals, the locality where we live, entertainment, and even in providing any service; money-paid service or free service.
     When a group of employers attempt any interview to try their luck, most of the interviewers, look into the details of employers' caste or religion information besides their academic& experience details. It is a fact that most of the interviewers (mostly in private sector) entertain only the candidates belong to their own caste or religion. In this regard 'caste' of the employ plays a vital role more than religion. Interviewers don't bother whether their selected 'caste-influenced' employs possess the required competencies of the job. Now, this is vividly noticeable in Engineering College faculty recruitment.
An unskilled, tactless employ, manages to get a job, gets more salary than a potential, skilled employ on the grounds of caste-religion influence. Can this influenced employ justify his job duties? Be it an example, can a caste/religion favoured faculty justify his/her students?
        In education sector too we find number of caste or religion-driven students and faculty. A Reddy parent wishes to join his son/daughter only in a college established by Reddys, likewise Naidus, Kammas, Kapus, and Chowdaries; in religion level too Muslim parents in Muslim colleges, Christian parents in Christian colleges. A Muslim faculty (in private sector) hardly find a job in a college established by Christians and vice-versa. Noticeable issues are evident that the faculty too unmindfully maintain this caste-religion domination, especially among themselves.
     In politics, most of the people vote for the candidates who belong to either their caste or religion. This is prevalent in almost all over India. In all sectors of elections, a Naidu voter only vote for Naidu candidate, likewise Reddys to Reddy, BC's to BC's, SC's to SC’s, Muslims to Muslim, Christians to Christian and so on. Most of the people's notion, in this regard, is they believe that "their" candidate only will do some favour for their welfare. Unfortunately, the situation also has become like "their" candidate try his/her best to favour only to his/her caste or religion people. I think this might also be the reason why we have been hear the words like "politics is corrupted.

     In the issue of marriage too caste& religion words concern a lot to us. In order to find a suitable person to marry off, almost 90% (I should say 99% I think) parents search only for their "caste" person. This is mostly noticeable in Hindu & Islam religions (of course in other religions too). No matter what kind of person he/she is while they do so. Even an 'other caste' fellow is good-natured or a good employ or well-educated we don't bother. We don't concern them but only our caste fellow, though he/she doesn't possess the above mentioned things. This is the plight of inter-caste marriages prevailed in our society. Not to talk about Inter-religion marriages, as it is almost a herculean effort to make them in Indian society. I think these typical nuances are the root causes for most of the eloped love marriages in India.

     Another pathetic situation prevailed due to this 'caste-religion mania' is, even finding a house for rent in a city like Guntur has become a tough task. When one go to a house to ask for rent-house, that has a tagged to-let board, the owner seeks the details of the people, whether they belong to their religion. (religion is a vital issue in this regard more than ones caste) If they don't belong to their religion, the house-owner rejects to offer rent-house to them. No religious house-owners are exempted in this issue. A Muslim house-owner offers his rent house only to a Muslim family, likewise Hindu house owners and Christian house owners. One of my friends being a Muslim once made a frantic search to find a rent-home for his sister. As they were new to Guntur, it took almost three months for them to find a house for rent, eventually managed to find it only in Muslims locality. This has almost become unavoidable problem in the cities like Guntur. Why? What's wrong with other religion people? Aren't they humans like us? If a religion house-owner doesn't wish to provide his rent-home to 'others', doesn't he think that same situation will rise of his religion rent-holders too?
     Surprisingly, in entertainment field too this 'manodu (our hero)' influence is not exempted. We do like the entire movie actress. But, being driven by caste, most of fans showcase their reserved liking in this regard too. It is mostly noticeable in Hindu fans. We have Chowdary hero fans, Naidu hero fans, Reddy and other hero fans. Haven't we?
       Friends, we are living in advanced, highly-modern 21 Century. But, our mania for 'caste & religion' preference has grounded us to very deep old age levels. How come a person's caste or religion becomes a parameter to decide his/her conduct and competencies? We have read Mulk Raj Anand's classic novel, 'Untouchable' which touches upon the caste system and its abuses, and we well appreciated it. What did we learn with the gist of this great novel? Unfortunately, the novel's great message could not instill any impact on us. We have been carrying the legacy of this caste-religion influence to the future generations...
Just think of this,
     Can we contribute for the development of our society with this caste-religion mania?
I think these are unanswerable queries in our society. Until and unless we cast away this caste-religion favour, these queries will remain unanswerable.
All these are not fictitious invented views. These issues do exist in our society. Most of us might have faced any one of the above mentioned problems, mild or severe ones, in our life. Mightn't we?
What do you say...?

 

Yours,
Vali Basha Shaik

M. A. English, B. Ed, M. Phil (Pursuing)
Asst. Professor of English
Guntur.

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