India's Silent Revolution - The Rise of the Low Castes in North Indian Politics

Author: Christophe Jaffrelot
Publisher: Permanent Black
Year: 2003
Language: English
Pages: 505
ISBN/UPC (if available): 8178240505

Description

This is a very fine and useful work, summarizing, synthesizing, and analyzing a vast amount of material to demonstrate the extent to which the transformations of caste politics have indeed led to fundamental as well as systemic changes in the Indian political system.

Since the 1960s a new assertiveness has characterized India’s formerly silent majority, the lower castes that comprise more than two-thirds of the country’s population. Today, India’s most populous state, Uttar Pradesh, is controlled by lower-caste politicians, as is Bihar and lower-caste representation in national politics is growing inexorably. Jaffrelot argues that this trend constitutes a genuine democratization of India, and that the social and economic effects of this silent revolution are bound to multiply in the years to come.

For anyone interested in Indian politics, post-Independence history, and the contemporary political scenario, this is an indispensable book.

Contents

Introduction

The North-South opposition
The two ages of democracy in India

PART I
Congress in Power or India as a Conservative Democracy

PART II
The Uneven Emancipation of the Lower Castes: Non-Brahmins in the South, OBCs in the North

PART III
Quota Politics and Kisan Politics: Complementarity and Competition

PART IV
The Upper Caste Political Domination on Trial:
The Congress (I), The BJP and Mandal

Select Bibliography

Index