Caste cauldron
Bibek Debroy
Posted online: 2010-06-27 23:40:05+05:30
Whether it is honour killings or Census, we never seem to be able to
get away from caste. In part, that is because public policy is
predicated on caste. If one divides the population into upper castes,
OBCs, SC-s and ST-s, the presumption is that upper castes are
relatively advantaged and there must be open-ended positive
affirmation in favour of OBCs, SC-s and STs. Any equitable society
must have positive affirmation in favour of the disadvantaged. The
debatable point is whether deprivation is best captured through
collective categories like caste or whether poverty is a
household-level characteristic. Since it is conceptually and factually
the latter, an equation with caste commits the double mistake of
assuming everyone in a backward caste is deprived and everyone in an
upper caste category is not. Consequently, because caste is
politically acceptable while non-caste identification of poverty is
not, we have gone round and round in circles since the Ninth Plan,
avoiding decentralised identification of the poor through
household-level characteristics. Since the 1991 reforms, growth rates
have picked up, though the spatial spread of trickle-down varies.
ST-s tend to be spatially concentrated, but OBCs and SC-s are not.
Clearly, in faster growing regions, rural Bharat is becoming
integrated with urban India.
Three questions arise. First, while there is no denying that OBCs,
SC-s and ST-s are relatively disadvantaged, have their absolute
conditions (a function of the indicator) improved since India moved to
a higher growth trajectory? Second, has relative inequality between
forward and backward castes increased or declined? Third, in
understanding deprivation and poverty, how important is caste as a
characteristic? Unfortunately, most of the discourse occurs in absence
of data. That's also the context in which caste as part of the census
needs to be understood. In a progressive society, caste should have no
role to play. But if we are stuck with caste in public policy
formulation, we might as well have better data. This book is based on
NCAER's National Survey of Household Income and Expenditure (NSHIE)
and throws up quite a few surprises. The only complaint is the
time-lag, since data are for 2004-05. This goes beyond the simple
time-lag issue. Anecdotally, based on some yet unpublished work by
Devesh Kapur and his colleagues in UP, one understands that improved
transport connectivity (roads and more than NHDP) has completely
transformed the lives of "Dalit"s.
This volume is descriptive and factual. It stays away from the
normative. It is also statistical rather than econometric, meaning
there is no estimation of functional forms to control for various
variables (in a ceteris paribus sense) to determine the impact of
caste once other variables have been controlled for. (That will no
doubt be done by other researchers using this dataset.) However,
judging from the correlations, one arrives at something that should be
obvious to all those who are not fixated on caste. Development and
poverty removal is a function of access to education, access to
integration with urban India (roads have a role in this), access to
financial services, access to land markets and access to salaried wage
employment (as opposed to subsistence -level self-employment). (There
are some State profiles too.) One shouldn't form the wrong impression.
The case for relative deprivation stands established.
However, the public policy implications for removing relative
deprivation are quite different. One needs to remedy this exclusion
and it is logically possible that exclusion is also due to caste. But
that case doesn't stand established. What is established is that
beginning with caste amounts to grasping the wrong end of the stick.
The crux is access to physical and social infrastructure.
A book that should be read, and certainly used, by everyone interested
in the caste debate, though the price is way out of line with the size
of the volume.
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