Why Does Caste Matter to US?

I think I found this after reading an email sent out on the ASATA listserv; it asked for participants for a survey on caste and Sikhism. Since I’m interested in both, I decided to take a quick look. The first notes wafted tentatively through my iBook’s wee speakers and I smiled: Van Halen. I knew exactly what kind of video this would be. We used to make ones just like it for JSA‘s Fall and Spring “State”, usually to open the conference. Well, it was either that or we’d blare Public Enemy‘s “Fight the Power“…

After watching it, I was moved, because I felt like so much of it was applicable to all of us, not just Sikhs. Someone Malayalee needs to make one of these, stat, I muttered…and then I realized that they didn’t. Maybe they should just watch this, I thought and that’s when I knew it belonged here, in a space where it would get the attention it rightly deserves.

Ravidasia // Khatri // Jatt // Tarkhan…The labels that divide us are endless. Caste, gender, class, and power tear apart our Qaum, our Gurdwaras, and our Pariwars. How do we overcome? How do we forge unity without silencing voices? [Jakara]

My closest friend in college was a Sikh girl from Fremont, who happened to be Tarkhan. My boyfriend from Freshman through Junior year was Jatt. So were all of his friends. They made fun of her when she wasn’t around and ignored her when she was. This baffled coconut-flavored me. “Why are you so mean to her?” I’d ask him, over and over. “She’s nice.”

“Because she’s…Tarkhan. They’re lower class. And so backwards– didn’t you say her parents tried to get her married when she was 17, that they didn’t even want to send her to college? Who the hell does that?”
“That’s not her fault, why are you taking it out on her?”
“Look, it’s a Sikh thing…it’s probably difficult to understand. Don’t you have a sorority thing to go to?”

::

I’m amazed at how often caste shows up on our comment threads, among second gen kids who should know better. Then I am humbled as I remember that I’m complicit in this too, when I tease my best friend about doing TamBrahm stuff or when I embroider stories from bygone UC Davis days with an extra adjective which probably isn’t necessary:

“Well a lot of students were from the Central Valley or Yuba City…so a good number of the desis I befriended were Jatt Sikh.”

It’s so insidious, the way this need to inform others of where we are in some dated hierarchy persists. Right now, we need to ask ourselves…why?

582 thoughts on “Why Does Caste Matter to US?

  1. But to share another anecdote…several years ago a friend (who is Jatt) and I travelled in Europe for a few weeks. In Germany, we stayed at the home of someone who was basically from a ‘Chamar’ background from the same village as my friend’s parents. This ‘low-caste’ man had married an Italian woman and was living in Germany with their two half-desi kids. Neither the wife nor the kids had ANY clue about the man’s low status back in India, and the exploitation his family had gone through. They had no idea that when my friend was visiting them, staying in their home, there was a very definite caste dynamic being played out just in the way that my friend and this man interacted with each other (my friend was very respectful and polite, but there was still something unspoken yet understood between them). In those cases, I can see why you would want to shield your kids from that info, just to protect their self esteem.

  2. NY-istan How many of us have actually listened to the stories of urban, middle-class, desi immigrant parents from lower castes or Dalit communities? Not many, I’m guessing

    I have some v.close friends who are Dalit and educated in the US who have returned since to India. They are doing quite well and tell me that creating a culture of learning at home helps a lot. And at the IITs or for that matter any public educational institution in India your caste does not help you get accepted. What you have scored in the JEE is all that matters. But where minority run institutions are concerned, religion and caste do matter. Joining the faculty too has nothing to do with caste. It is based on academic credentials. The IITs have an affirmative hiring program and have had some success in recent years in attracting faculty from under-represented groups. But then again hiring and retaining talent is hard work. So give it some time. I have a Dalit friend who did undergrad at a state-run engg school and went to IIT for grad school and now lives in the US. The person tells me that IIT offered a vastly more supportive environment.

    You haven’t been to the courts in Madras obviously. Because if you have you wouldn’t for the most time know anyone’s caste identity.

  3. How/when did your “mixed caste” identity affect your social life in the diaspora? I’d be really curious to know and maybe even relate since I don’t know many people who claim mixed caste heritage…

    Hi feministador. It was only in my middle teens that I really started to understand these things. Until then I’d grown up in a largely white area of South West London and most of my Indian friends who lived in my town were Sikh. So I had a sheltered and idealistic upbringing, very liberal, very cosmopolitan, and caste was never a factor in my relationship with my Indian buddies. They were like me, in that the brown identity trumped all others. It was only when meeting and talking to members of my extended family around my mid teens, and hearing tales about what my parents went through to get married, that I became conscious of this whole thing. Forming relationships at University was when I became exposed to other Indians who were much more informed into this way of thinking than me, who came from families where it was a more obvious and immediate marker of identity alongside religion and ethnicity, Hindu, Sikh, Gujarati, Punjabi. For most of them it was just curiousity value, to get a sense of your background, mostly harmless, just another complexity of Indian identity, but in some cases you got a sense that it was a badge of pride and chauvinism towards you. I have developed a sensibility to stay away from those kinds of people, to actively avoid them, because the trivial and small time mentality of it is something I cannot abide. All my Indian friends are the ones who think like me, the only family members I stay close to, or have respect for, are the ones who don’t abide by this, and mock and laugh at the mentality with me. The modern world (at least here in the UK) is slowly destroying them, and that is the mindset that takes care of small-time people who hold it in their hearts, it makes you stronger and more streamlined. The rest can go and jump off a cliff. At a certain level you just have to walk up to the crease, bat in hand, and grow a stone in your head that says to the small time people (excuse the language) ‘Fuck You’. And you will be happy.

  4. I have developed a sensibility to stay away from those kinds of people, to actively avoid them, because the trivial and small time mentality of it is something I cannot abide. All my Indian friends are the ones who think like me, the only family members I stay close to, or have respect for, are the ones who don’t abide by this, and mock and laugh at the mentality with me.
    The rest can go and jump off a cliff. At a certain level you just have to walk up to the crease, bat in hand, and grow a stone in your head that says to the small time people (excuse the language) ‘Fuck You’. And you will be happy.

    I could have written that, verbatim…in fact the only time I had to tell a relative (ish)/friend to fuck off was in that context. So amen

  5. I am still to met a Sriram who is not Brahmin, or a Ilamaran who is.

    That’s true, although anecdotally, there are probably examples. For example, with a name like Sivakumar or Ganesan, you could be Brahmin or not Brahmin (and I’ve met both). Since people living in the South typically don’t use tags like Gounder or Iyer, it’s hard to know from just the name. I think the ultimate caste identifier in Tamil Nadu at least is the way people speak Tamil. Every subcaste, and every different region, seems to have its own vocabulary/dialect.

    I never made the Ilamaran/Amudhan/Raghavan casteist connection in Vettaiyaadu Vilaiyaadu, but that’s very interesting.

    On another note, someone said earlier that familiarity with Bollywood movies, and a disdain for South Indian food made them feel more “at home” within the Indian student community at college. It’s a good thing I went to college centuries ago, or I would have been a total outcast. And jeez, who doesn’t like a good dosa every now and then?

  6. The funny thing is how in the context of the modern world, they seem so small time and pathetic. It’s a world in which you can do what you want to do, be what you want to be, and yet they still stick their nose in the air and act like snobs over some thing their grandparents told them about who did what in a village somewhere thousands of miles away. How hilarious and deluded!

  7. it matters to us because it matters to our parents or grandparents. because ideas like the importance of the caste system and the superiority of one group over another, get passed down through generations. caste continues to matter to my grandmother who has 3 white daughter-in-laws, 5 mixed grandchildren, and who lived in western countries for 25 years. it matters to her so much, that she thinks, i, one of her mixed grandchildren, should marry a tambrahm, specifically and iyengar (to which my mother says “why, you’re already impure anyway”).

    interesting. i dont know many mixed iyengars. please, for the love of god dont think your impure in any way. im sure you are beautiful.

  8. Been There Done That (#252)

    And at the IITs or for that matter any public educational institution in India your caste does not help you get accepted.

    I am aghast at your comment. Ever heard of the Mandal Commission? College reservation has been a hot-button topic for more than 15 yrs now (likely much longer, I’ve been acutely aware of it for at least that time). All govt colleges are required to offer caste-based reservation on at least 25% of the seats. To continue, there’s reservation in govt hirings. And the govt is considering bringing legislation mandating reservation in private companies!!! Google for both and you’ll find ample examples.

    Right now its gotten to be such that there’s reverse casteism against non-OBC/SC/ST candidates who do not have vast sums of money to go to private colleges – that would be the majority. And typically the qualification cutoff for ‘open’ seats vs. reserved seats is orders of magnitude different. I remember the year I got into college via public entrance exams, cutoff on open seats was something like 92% marks vs. reserved seats which was 15%. We used to joke that one could secure 15% marks simply by selecting answers at random. Razib can probably tell you that it isn’t a joke.

    And then there’s ‘creamy layer’- the people who’ve taken advantage of reservation and improved their lot, and yet their kids continue to avail of the advantages they should not need anymore. I had classmates in college who’s fathers were VERY high in govt – Deputy Superintendent of Police and such, and so were a second gen milking the law.

    Whether or not you believe reservation is a good thing in educational institutions, at least acknowledge the facts.

  9. Ok, 200 comments and only one person has self identified as a lower caste! Surely more than one commenter belongs to a lower caste!

    Add one more. I’m of a “low caste” origin.

    It is fun to read the comments. It is one thing to read and learn about “caste system” and another to live and experience it. I have lived my first 23 years in India, grew up in an urban environment with relatives in rural areas.

    I think the situation is improving at a far greater speed than imagined for the so called “lower castes” with numbers based democracy.. I’m afraid that there will be a reverse caste discrimination unless the “few upper castes” get rid of their stupid “high birth sentiments”.. 🙂

    Already Brahmins have realised that in UP and started kissing Mayawati’s behind.

  10. Post #230 female foeticide is quite alamingly the highest among Sikh Jatts

    Yes that is so true.

  11. hema: “On another note, someone said earlier that familiarity with Bollywood movies, and a disdain for South Indian food made them feel more “at home” within the Indian student community at college. It’s a good thing I went to college centuries ago, or I would have been a total outcast. And jeez, who doesn’t like a good dosa every now and then?”

    No, no, just the opposite!! (see comment #203). I would stuff myself full of rava dosai all day long if I could.

  12. On another note, someone said earlier that familiarity with Bollywood movies, and a disdain for South Indian food made them feel more “at home” within the Indian student community at college. Check out Annapurna (in the Bay Area) if you get a chance. The folks there make a mean rava dosa on the one side, and serve up yummy movie songs on the other.

  13. Interesting perspective from Rajiv Srinivasan re Mayawati’s caste-based victory in the recent elections. http://rajeev2007.wordpress.com/2007/05/11/up-elections-the-persistence-of-caste/

    Hmmm, so thats where you get your absurd ideas about caste being a good thing all around; that it exists in every nation; that its a social security blanket for the low castes, and other such nonsense? Here are some of the silly points Srinivasan makes in that article:

    For reasons best known to themselves, female politicians in India tend to be capricious and throw tantrums (Exhibits A and B: Jayalalitha and Mamta Banerjee) and generally create havoc.

    This misogynist nut sounds like someone who would probably love to revive the “glorious” brahminical custom of burning women alive in the funeral pyres of their dead husbands.

    It has become a conditioned reflex for Indians to believe that caste is unremittingly evil. But jati and varnam are merely a codification of the fact that all humans are not born equal in their endowments: some are tall, some are fat, some are musically talented, and so on. Caste is about the ruthless Bell Curve, and is about as inescapable as race.

    In other words, this brahmin bigot is claiming that it is an “inescapable fact” that brahmins are born with superior endowments, that untouchables, sudras etc are condemned by birth to an inferior status. Nothing new about that. That is the orthodox brahmin belief.

    In fact, caste must be useful, which is why it has survived for so long

    What a complete moron. Slavery survived for millenia as well and it too was useful…to the slaveowners. Just as casteism has been berry berry good to brahmins. But how “useful” were/are these discredited institutions to the slaves and untouchables? Of course this heartless creature cannot be expected to empathize with their plight: for after all they are born on the wrong side of the Bell Curve; they are not “born equal in their endowments” to him and his kind.

    It is entertaining that allegedly egalitarian Communist states too have their castes: rulers’ offspring get the plum jobs.

    Whats entertaining is his stupidity in equating casteism, which has a religious basis, to nepotism among atheists.

    BTW, this Rajiv Srinivasan is the same obnoxiously chauvinist brahmin who announced that the Tsunami that killed 100s of thousands in 2004 was divine wrath for the arrest on charges of murder of his fellow brahmin the Kanchi Shankaracharya!

    http://www.rediff.com/news/2004/dec/27rajeev.htm

    “The devastation by the tsunami in Tamil Nadu, could it be a caveat from Up There about the atrocities being visited on the Kanchi Acharya?……It is said that the very elements can be affected by the mystical powers of sages who have acquired superhuman powers through meditation and sadhana. I think we should all tread carefully, for now we are treading on things we do not know.”

    Check out the angry responses to his idiotic and callous assertion. Here’s one: “Dear Mr.Srinivasan ,what kind of a god do u believe in who chooses to punish people who have done no wrong? And yes, divine wrath seems to extends all the way to the Andamans and also Sri Lanka and Thailand. The writer smuggles in his silly propaganda in the most inappropriate way.

    The guy is bonkers.

  14. Like Red Snapper, I’m “mixed caste” too – Punjabi and Tamil. There are small minded people in this world, like my ex Punjabi Brahmin girfriend who was astounded that one of my cousins married a Sikh Jat. She was an atheist, very westernized, and still had this caste pride. My parents went through hell – the Tamil side thinking all Punjabi men were womanizing drinkards, the Punjabi side thinking Tamils were Madrassis, alien and below them. It took many years for things to resolve. It is encouraging to see the profusion of inter-caste and inter-region marriages in the West. These kids will either be half-desi or belong to two desi cultures and belong to a desi community far more open then the one we grew up in. I too cursed those who alluded to the purity of their parents “within caste” marriages.

  15. OK, 200 comments and only 1 person has self indentified with a lower caste

    I thought my caste was low????

  16. “These people find it more important to have huge mandirs in their home showing how religious they are instead of being people who serve other people. Madness. Its worse than madness, its willful heartlessness this obscene lack of human charity and compassion.”

    Yeah–shows how corrupt all religions become. In their beginnings, they made sense and inspired people to be better. Then, ego kicks in and religion just becomes another tool to get what you want, and do unto others what you would not have them do unto you. Depressing.

  17. So many comments made in this very interesting discussion but nobody has brought up some important points to consider/discuss. The med school students protesting the reservations for admission in medical school, the fact that the “scheduled” castes pretty much control political power in Bihar and tend to marginalize the higher castes in backlash, and the Kashmiri pandits who are refugees in their own country and because of reservations, can’t obtain good paying jobs and are now performing work that was “traditionally” relegated to the lower castes. People want to vilify the caste system but what happens when it turns itself upside down?

  18. dc: “waking up every Saturday mornign to a blaring M.S. version of the Suprabatham…”

    this was my dad’s supposedly “clever” strategy of waking me up in the morning without having to face my wrath in person. now when i visited, i am delighted by the sounds of his own top-volume rendition. it’s. just. great.

  19. BTW, this Rajiv Srinivasan is the same obnoxiously chauvinist brahmin who announced that the Tsunami that killed 100s of thousands in 2004 was divine wrath for the arrest on charges of murder of his fellow brahmin the Kanchi Shankaracharya!

    Right about his idiocy…except he’s not Brahmin.

  20. One suspects that Prema has brahmin anger issues (completely understandable). It would be better if you did not let anger interfere with your arguments; they sometimes come out as irrational and detract from the many important and interesting points that you do make. Anger is sometimes good if properly harnessed…but should never be allowed to come in the way of rationality.

  21. OK, 200 comments and only 1 person has self indentified with a lower caste

    Isn’t that because a majority of the post-1965 gen immigrants were upper caste? Their offspring are on this site.

  22. OK, 200 comments and only 1 person has self indentified with a lower caste Isn’t that because a majority of the post-1965 gen immigrants were upper caste? Their offspring are on this site.

    I think yes.. But a subtantial part of the neo-IT crowd in US ( yeah.. yeah.. the code coolies 🙂 ) is non-upper caste and includes a significant number of Dalits. So you’d see a lot of desi off-springs in the next 10-20 years in US claiming to be of low caste origins..

  23. But a subtantial part of the neo-IT crowd in US ( yeah.. yeah.. the code coolies 🙂 ) is non-upper caste and includes a significant number of Dalits.

    What has changed since the first wave of immigration in the 60s and 70s which was mostly upper caste?

  24. What has changed since the first wave of immigration in the 60s and 70s which was mostly upper caste?

    The IT wave is led by the companies in the South recruiting thousands from the South. And the resource pool consists of students from all castes due to the reservation policies enforced by the governments in the South particularly Karnataka and Tamilnadu.

  25. What has changed since the first wave of immigration in the 60s and 70s which was mostly upper caste?

    Many factors:

    a) An exponential growth of engineering colleges in India.

    b) Y2K, and outsourcing revolution reaching people who would otherwise seek government jobs in India.

    c) Dramatic growth in high tech private companies, especially outsourcing outfits.

    d) Recent increase in reservations at all levels – college admissions, wagehera, wagehera…….Mandal Commission, etc.

  26. “BTW, this Rajiv Srinivasan is the same obnoxiously chauvinist brahmin who announced that the Tsunami that killed 100s of thousands in 2004 was divine wrath for the arrest on charges of murder of his fellow brahmin the Kanchi Shankaracharya!”

    “Right about his idiocy…except he’s not Brahmin.”

    Srinivasan is a common name among my caste, Thiyaans in Kerala – I don’t think he’d be a Brahmin

  27. Srinivasan is a common name among my caste, Thiyaans in Kerala – I don’t think he’d be a Brahmin

    Srinivasan is also a very common Brahmin name in the south, so you really can’t tell just from the name, IMO. Now, if he were to call himself Rajeev Menon, that would be a different issue altogether.

  28. Srinivasan is also a very common Brahmin name in the south, so you really can’t tell just from the name, IMO. Now, if he were to call himself Rajeev Menon, that would be a different issue altogether.

    He is thiyyan. That is the community of Narayana Guru, the famous Hindu reformer from Kerala.

  29. interesting…Yes, your right about the Menons. And I guess the Subrahmanians is also a definite brahmin surname?

  30. I guess the Subrahmanians is also a definite brahmin surname?

    I wouldn’t say it’s a “definite brahmin surname.” I think, like many other South Indian names, it can go either way.

    For example, Krishnan is a very common surname in the South, and it’s not limited to Brahmins in usage. I think it’s too hard just to tell caste from a person’s name in the South, most of the time.

  31. 259 and #252 : Addressing the issues of IIT Reservation

    You are definitely right, Seeker. Most people in my generation who have grown up ‘caste-blind’ for the most part of their lives are forced to end up hating the lower castes, or at least the politics of caste, by the time they reach 18. Students sacrifice 2-4 years of their lives studying to crack the IIT-JEE exam, often even letting go of their State/Central Board exams to study for the JEE. It is one thing to be competing with a million brainy Indian kids who have been eating,sleeping and drinking IIT-JEE tests for 3 years … it is a whole different emotion when politicians make it twice as hard for you to get in by saying ‘an additional 27% of these seats are going to lower caste people by default’ .. effectively that’s 50% of the seats ! (25% was already reserved for them)

    The worst part is that this is helping No one: The ‘lower-caste’ people who reach the IIT entrance stage are already so educated ( they would have completed pre-university Science, which is pretty hard ) that they don’t need/deserve a helping hand of ‘pity’. The actual people who are suffering are not gaining a thing… and even worse, a 100,000 students who deserved to be there are not going to get a seat in the IIT.

    Not only are most of our parents/aunts/uncles keeping caste alive and well in the modern day, it is the flawed policies like this as well that push young, smart, otherwise caste-blind youths down this slippery slope.

  32. And I guess the Subrahmanians is also a definite brahmin surname?

    no probability may be high, but not definite; i am working with a non brahmin “satish subramanian” as we speak.

  33. i am working with a non brahmin “satish subramanian” as we speak.

    Ok, just out of curiosity, how did you figure out the “non brahmin” bit? Common knowledge? You asked? He told you? From the way he speaks whatever Indian vernacular he speaks?

    What I’m saying is, you couldn’t have known just from the name.

  34. It is one thing to be competing with a million brainy Indian kids who have been eating,sleeping and drinking IIT-JEE tests for 3 years … it is a whole different emotion when politicians make it twice as hard for you to get in by saying ‘an additional 27% of these seats are going to lower caste people by default’ .. effectively that’s 50% of the seats ! (25% was already reserved for them)

    This is slightly disingenuous since the plan also calls for a proportional increase in the number of total seats (proportional to the increase in reservation, that is). Now there are genuine questions about student-faculty ratio (due to faculty shortage), resources available per student etc,if this happens and these are worth debating.

  35. I think it’s too hard just to tell caste from a person’s name in the South, most of the time.

    yes its often not easy. but many northies have their own obfuscation techniques also – like the changing of surname to ‘Kumar’, or so i’ve heard.

  36. Geeta, Caste names do play an interesting (but not obvious) role in popular Tamil culture. For instance, in a recent Kamalhassan movie, the hero’s name was Raghavan while the two psycho villains were called Ilamaran and Amudhan.

    Looks like you missed a few other things – Raghavan (a very common name among non-brahmins) the cop loves his meen kozhambu and gets into the chase when Ilamaran and Amudhan murder the Christian DSP’s daughter. It is irony indeed for Geeta to allege casteism of some sort on Kamalahasan’s part when the guy can get very PC.

    Prema,

    Rajeev isn’t a brahmin. But Mamata Banerjee and Jayalalita (the two women he calls capricious) And that tsunami related musings were in response to the Indian Commie/Stalinist loons’ speculation that the tsunami was tail end of the “tidal wave” of communalism that had been washed away earlier that year in the Lok Sabha elections. Rajeev is a very smart guy (and probably headed for a position at the Hoover Institution one of these days) so you shd read that article once again. Rajeev isn’t a brahmin. But Mamata Banerjee and Jayalalita, the two women he calls capricious, riling you mightily are brahmin! Looks like he knew how you would react. And you fell for it!!

    Jati is a form of social capital everywhere in India. Time and again communities in India have prospered by sticking together and bargaining collectively. It has helped many of OBC groups for 2,000 years; where most of India’s princely families are drawn from (and that goes all the way back to about 1500 BCE); it has helped groups such as the Mahars in Maharashtra and many others in UP (including UP’s Brahmins) to gain political influence. When you have a stagnant communist/socialist economy like India’s with limited opportunities collective bargaining works quite well. But unfortunately when power goes to peoples’ heads (as has happened with the Karunanidhi clan) a political party ends up resembling an alliance. It happened in the North when the Janata Party broke up along caste lines (Jat, Yadav, Kurmi, etc) and also along Braj-Awadh lines (Bihar vs. UP – Lalloo vs. Mulayam) and even Maithil vs. Bhojpur – Sharad Yadav vs. Lallo Yadav. It is now happening slowly in TN. The Vanniars, Vellalars (which is Karunanidhi belongs to), Naidus, and Thevars stuck together for years within the DMK. The Thevars first moved out with MGR (who was actually a Menon from Kerala but was all but conferred Thevar’ship due to his close ties with the community in Madurai). Then the Vanniars moved out with the PMK (that is the Ramadoss empire). Vaiko and the Naidus moved out when he realised that Karunanidhi cared only about his family. Now the Nadars (Sarat Kumar) are moving out of both the AIADMK and DMK. What about the really hard up folks? The Dalits? This time MK stitched up a coalition of sorts and kept everyone together. But can his family continue the work? Do they even care? That is why Mayawati’s stunning (stunning only for us chatterati) coup in UP should worry every tinpot tyrant in India. Here’s a solid non-pandering coalition of people with very little political clout who have come together to trump the imperial feudals (the Congress and its tall and fair Nehru/Gandhi overlords), the muscle men/landed groups (equally spread across the SP and BJP) and an assorted crowd of rootless wonders (the left loons). This could happen anywhere in India even nationally. Every conventional political party beware. Work for the people or else prepare to be eclipsed.

  37. Ok, just out of curiosity, how did you figure out the “non brahmin” bit?
    What I’m saying is, you couldn’t have known just from the name.

    of course i could not have. i couldnt have known just from other physical attributes (like height, wt, “fairness”, looks) either. dialect works but again, not always. in this case i know cuz his “love marriage” to a brahmin girl was opposed by both their families due to caste/customs incompatibility.

  38. Rajeev is a very smart guy (and probably headed for a position at the Hoover Institution one of these days)

    Hoover, wow am I impressed!!!! Geniuses like the brilliantly sharp Dinesh D’Souza are fellows… (sorry couldn’t resist)

  39. It is irony indeed for Geeta to allege casteism of some sort on Kamalahasan’s part when the guy can get very PC.

    Oh, I don’t think anyone was accusing Kamalhaasan of anything nefarious. I think the point was that a name like Raghavan could go either way, but Ilamaran and Amudhan are almost definitely not Brahmin names…and apparently, some folks who saw the movie latched on to this as a “casteist” idea. I have to admit, I never noticed it myself.

    Of course, I also didn’t notice the apparently uber-obvious gay vibe between the two baddies, so take what I say with a pinch of salt.

  40. @sigh! –

    ” This is slightly disingenuous since the plan also calls for a proportional increase in the number of total seats (proportional to the increase in reservation, that is).”

    Correct me if I’m wrong, but the logic with the above statement seems to hint that the 27% of seats reserved won’t be ‘stolen’ from the deserving, rather, they are going to be added ‘extra’ seats. Again, we come to exactly the same argument – if the institution can actually accomodate 27% more ‘extra’ seats, they should be given to the people who deserve them as well ! No matter how many additional seats are ‘created’ for the lower-castes , the fact remains that these very facilities could/should have been used to reward the thousands of candidates who rightfully deserved a seat after cracking the JEE. Regardless of how they try, the ‘stealing’ is going to happen via caste quotas… and there is no way to deny that fact.

    .. and for this reason the caste-system in India will live on for decades to come .. because no party will be powerful enough to ‘take away’ the quotas.

  41. randomizer, Your original point was that reservation would make it harder ,relative to the extant situation, for “open” categories to get into IITs. I pointed out that if implemented,it would not change the status quo as far as difficulty is concerned. Now you are arguing something different. You are questioning the very logic of reservation by saying that the new seats should be “open”. This argument is tantamount to questioning even the reservation that exists now, and is a wholly different argument (i don’t want to go into it now, but for the record I am for reservation, but I would like to see it implemented differently, but that would require far more resources than are available now; so as it exists now it a poor and imperfect second choice).

  42. Hoover, wow am I impressed!!!! Geniuses like the brilliantly sharp Dinesh D’Souza are fellows… (sorry couldn’t resist)

    Check out their directory of fellows here, are a lot of very smartpeople. Hoover is economically conservative and socially moderate, hence attracts the scions of the wealthy as well as those who have struggled v.hard to make it in life and think everyone else shd, such as Thomas Sowell. Hoover’s politics may be a hard sell on SM (except for say, Vinod). But then if you knew what sort of place Hoover is you wouldn’t act snarky would you? Aah! The joys of ignorance! Hoover is a conservative thinktank run out of Stanford (Rajeev is an alum of IIT Madras and Stanford GSB – so that explains his hauteur) so the entry bar is very high. Don’t worry sigh! you aren’t about to receive an invite from Hoover.

    A name like Ilamaran (young warrior) would mark out the person as being from a very influential, powerful (in terms of musclepower), and wealthy family. It is not a name that would be given without hard thought.

    Satish, Arun, Navin, Kripa, Prithvin, Nandakumar, Uday, Hari – any idea whom I am talking about? Karunanidhi, Dayanidhi, Kalanidhi, Sabareesh, Ashwin, all Sanskrit names, and everyone of them is from Tamizhnadu!

  43. A name like Ilamaran (young warrior) would mark out the person as being from a very influential, powerful (in terms of musclepower), and wealthy family. It is not a name that would be given without hard thought.

    I admit that I don’t know much about Tamil naming customs, but couldn’t giving someone that name simply mean you aspire for them to be influential, powerful, wealthy, etc? Just a relection of their parents’ hopes and dreams for their child in an ideal world?

  44. relating to the “Jat” comments earlier. I dont get why being decended from central asian people/arabs/persians is considered “superior”. Its not like these countries are world beating places. Seems that most of them have performed dismally.

  45. Amitabh, Unfortunately feudal oppression extends to many things including the names people bear. There are some villages in TN where Dalits must walk barefoot or risk being thrashed by Ilamarans.

  46. I admit that I don’t know much about Tamil naming customs, but couldn’t giving someone that name simply mean you aspire for them to be influential, powerful, wealthy, etc? Just a relection of their parents’ hopes and dreams for their child in an ideal world?

    Amitabh,

    I think this is not relevant to the topic in hand. But since you asked, yes, your guess is right..

    But the idea of the original commenter was based on the assumption that “ilamaran and amudhan are pure Tamil names” and Brahmins with their emphasis on Sanskrit would not have those names. I don’t think there was any ulterior “caste” motive in naming those psycho villains with “tamil names” and hero with a “Brahminic” name. The director’s (gautam) earlier movie “kakka kakka” hero’s name was “anbu selvan” and his friend “ila maran”, good Tamil names..