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Soumitra Shukla

@soumitrashukla9

1/9 On Bourdieu, caste, and social class 🧵 In India, caste IS class in practice. It bundles economic, cultural, social & symbolic capital that society instantly reads as “status.” The state even uses caste lists (SC/ST/OBC) to target class disadvantage.

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Soumitra Shukla

@soumitrashukla9

2/9 Bourdieu’s insight: class = composition & volume of capital: economic (money), cultural (credentials/accent), social (networks), symbolic (prestige). Indian caste crystallizes ALL of these into a durable hierarchy.

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Soumitra Shukla

@soumitrashukla9

3/9 India operationalizes “Socially & Educationally Backward Classes” via caste lists. These aren’t just labels, they’re live policy instruments for admissions & public jobs, treating caste as a workable proxy for historical social disadvantage.

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Soumitra Shukla

@soumitrashukla9

4/9 Landmark precedent: Indra Sawhney (1992) explicitly allows caste as proxy for social class, targeting “social & educational backwardness,” while rejecting purely income-based criteria.

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Soumitra Shukla

@soumitrashukla9

5/9 Why this maps to Bourdieu: caste co-moves with wealth, schooling, networks, accents, pedigree—exactly the bundle of capitals that creates recognizable social class positions.

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Soumitra Shukla

@soumitrashukla9

6/9 The Mandal Commission constituted in the early 1980s embedded this Bourdieusian logic: identify backward classes via “social and educational criteria,” using caste as the organizing signal. Income helps target policy (“creamy layer”), but DOESN’T define the category.

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Soumitra Shukla

@soumitrashukla9

7/9 Historical note: Before “Scheduled Castes,” British colonial policy called them “Depressed Classes.” The 1935 Government of India Act formalized caste-based classifications that persist in modern India’s affirmative action.

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Soumitra Shukla

@soumitrashukla9

8/9 Early pioneer: Princely Mysore under Maharaja Krishnaraja Wadiyar IV introduced reservations in 1921 for “backward classes” including Depressed Classes, decades before independence.

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Soumitra Shukla

@soumitrashukla9

9/9 Administrators have long treated caste as social class for policy. Articles 15(4), 16(4), and 340 built on this caste-as-class framework to direct benefits to the structurally excluded. It’s not accidental but institutional design.

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