22 ms·

My Caste

• zero_k 3y ago
  I work on a regular basis with the author, and we have discussed caste before. I guess the most I can add to the story is that he is very supportive of all those who have not been given the chance, for whatever reason, to excel. For example he is a staunch supporter of women's rights (just check out his track record of both hiring and retaining female talent as PhD/PostDoc), and speaks up regularly for those who are oppressed. I like that he used Freedom of Information regulation to get information on discrimination. This reminds me of an old friend who did the same here in Germany, about West vs East-Germany born heads of universities. The ratio is way-way worse than you might imagine. It's not the same level of oppression as in India, but those who think this issue is far from Europe need not look further than the heart of the EU itself.
• known 3y ago
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• pexabit 3y ago
  Helpful context would be that some groups in India can parlay their political power and social prestige into oppression certificates ("OBC") that lets them into top universities with scores much lower than everybody else. Which... fine... whatever -- politics is politics. But it is funny, delusional even, to see the author act as if these certificates should have any currency in the west.
• known 3y ago
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• LordShredda 3y ago
  Would it be possible for the government to 'phase out' last names and instead rely on other forms of identification? Instead of putting in your name in an application form, you just list an id number and your address. Then when you show up, you only mention your first and middle name.
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  • teachrdan 3y ago
    I just posted this on a probably-dead thread about caste discrimination, but the short of it is the folks who wish to discriminate by caste have a variety of ways to determine what your caste is. From the Vice article below: Indians will not ask outright what caste you are, as it’s seen as overly discriminatory, but they use more subtle methods to identify your place in the caste structure. “Sometimes they ask, ‘Are you vegetarian?’ If you say yes, they ask are you vegetarian by birth or by choice, before getting into which village you come from, because sometimes the village gives up your caste,” Sam said. Another method described to VICE News is the pat on the back to see if the person is wearing a Juneau, a sacred white thread typically worn by the upper castes in India. Higher-caste Indians will also search social media accounts to ascertain a job candidate’s religious views or diet. https://www.vice.com/en/article/3azjp5/silicon-valley-has-a-caste-discrimination-problem https://www.vice.com/en/article/3azjp5/silicon-valley-has-a-...
    • alehlopeh 3y ago
      What could vegetarian by birth possibly mean
      • curtisblaine 3y ago
        I guess born in a vegetarian family, educated as a vegetarian.
        • hef19898 3y ago
          Can a born vegetarian be identified by measuring, I don't know, the diameter of nostrils or distance between nose tip and chin? And if so, do born vegans differ from those measurwmemts? And do they get bonus points? Sarcasm aside, this whole caste system is easily a contentender for the worst form discrimination and, yes, racism is existence today.
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• yieldcrv 3y ago
  > An uninitiated might be forgiven for not realizing that caste-based discrimination is rampant in India Don’t mind all the people from India, outside of India, that will swear up and down that such thing doesn’t exist I feel like there is a group of people taking advantage of western sensitivities against “being insensitive”, and reappropriating it when convenient to deflect I’m glad Seattle passed a law against caste discrimination, just this year, since there are so many people from India in the tech industry there it was eventually able to be noticed, but that ends right at Seattle’s city limits and more awareness and uniform regulation is needed We get a skewed perspective of India’s identity politics because of a lack of representation from different groups in India
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• isanjay 3y ago
  > I was, however, not ready to publicly declare it until I received tenure as it seemed too risky Risk of what ? Seems a bit exaggerating. > There are at most five tenure-track faculty who belong to OBC category among all the faculty members in North America's "top" 50 CS departments > What evidence do I have to support my claim? And then continues to show castes of faculty at IIT. Am I missing something here ?
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  • xmonkee 3y ago
    >Risk of what ? Seems a bit exaggerating. There is a whole paragraph answering this question: ``` An uninitiated might be forgiven for not realizing that caste-based discrimination is rampant in India (yes, even among faculty members at IITs), and perhaps worse among Non-Resident Indians (NRIs). Therefore, there was always fear of what would a potential letter writer or someone on tenure evaluation committee think of me if they knew I belonged to OBC. It was the same fear that stopped me from mentioning anything about my caste in any of DEI statements that I prepared for the job search or tenure: I had to pretend not to know what it feels to be under-represented. ``` >> There are at most five tenure-track faculty who belong to OBC category among all the faculty members in North America's "top" 50 CS departments The full quote is: >I think I can summarize the lack of representation with the help of a claim that I believe is true: There are at most five tenure-track faculty who belong to OBC category among all the faculty members in North America's "top" 50 CS departments. Any reasonable process to pick 50 CS departments should suffice. I will, of course, be overjoyed to be corrected. So, this is a claim they believe is true and would be happy to be corrected. Please go ahead and correct them if you disagree. >And then continues to show castes of faculty at IIT. This is literally preceded by >You might ask: What evidence do I have to support my claim? So, to lay it out for you: 1) Hypothesis: There is discrimination against OBC in academia 2) Evidence: The near absence of OBC professors in IITs 3) Prediction: This probably affects OBCs outside India as well I am Indian, from an IIT, and I have seen this kind of knee-jerk dismissal from higher-caste Indians against any claims of discrimination more times than I can count. I do not believe you are making a good-faith argument here.
• cleandreams 3y ago
  I had a student in my class who wrote about being from a "low caste" background. So when a friend hosted a woman from India on her podcast who said there was so caste discrimination in India I spoke up about this. The podcast guest said that the fact that anyone in the west mentioned caste discrimination, even within western tech companies, was an act of racism against Indian culture and reflected colonial judgements. My friend, who is very, very woke, agreed. I was so annoyed. Thank you for bringing this up. Such discrimination has no place!
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  • caesil 3y ago
    That person should be banned from ever invoking "intersectionality" again. They've failed one of its most basic tests.
  • yieldcrv 3y ago
    ha this matches my observation I think at this point we could just double down and say “I’m fighting colonialism, on the side of the colonizers” Just throw the meme back, and still stamp out caste discrimination “hey some cultural genocide is worth it” first, the reaction would be funny af, especially if all the “OBC’s” get the joke
  • dotnet00 3y ago
    I would've been in the same camp of denying it and treating it as just a thing westerners exaggerate and to an extent that is the case. But at the same time caste discrimination is still very much a thing. The way I've seen people in the west envision it is that everyone is keenly aware of their caste, where they are in society and what they're "allowed" to do. But it isn't that blatant to me, so I felt impressions of caste discrimination were overblown. I was raised to be caste-blind (literally wasn't taught the differences to be able to even subconsciously be biased) so I projected that upon everyone. However as I've interacted with other Indians, I have noticed that our conversations tend to be very different. I don't really care about where they're from, barely care about their name beyond how to refer to them etc, mostly interested in what they do professionally and what they're interested in while their questions tend to focus on where I'm from and what my family history is. My understanding is that my caste is fairly mundane so I haven't really noticed any discrimination towards myself, but I think I've atleast noticed that many people have a lot of interest in identifying the caste at least, which can obviously lead to discrimination pretty easily.
• slowhadoken 3y ago
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• raincom 3y ago
  Maybe, it is time to think what discriminations are, what caste-discriminations are: https://www.hipkapi.com/2011/03/24/normative-assumptions-discriminations-and-caste-discriminations/ https://www.hipkapi.com/2011/03/24/normative-assumptions-dis...
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  • crooked-v 3y ago
    > I was invited by some Sadhus from Swami Narayan Temple (BAPS) to visit the temple and have a discussion with them. Because they practice very strict Brahmacharya (eight types of avoiding women, each correlated to an organ: it is called Ashtanga Brahmacharya), the Sadhus said that women could not be present during our discussions, while they were welcome to visit the temple. > A few years later, one of my teachers from Belgium visited another wing of the Swami Narayan people and found that ‘women were discriminated against’ because they were allowed only to come some distance from the temple when the Sadhus were present. > The question here is: why did these people (my students and my teacher) experience ‘discrimination’, where I saw none and also knew that none was intended? Dropped the article right there. Having a genuine religious belief doesn't automatically excuse discrimination, and I have zero interest in reading more from someone who thinks that it does.
    • rhuru 3y ago
      Discriminating in private life and affairs is not just a basic human right but also necessary for the wellbeing of people. Imagine you are not allowed to pick gender on Tinder. Would that be a good example ? These are nor discriminations, these are perfectly valid life choices that make our society diverse. The problem is when your boss refuses you promotion or when government decides to have a higher tax rate for you because of your identity.
  • lozenge 3y ago
    The article boils down to "discrimination is bad, treating people differently by sex or caste is okay, therefore I don't want to call it discrimination, regardless of whether it is or not".
• FactsNotFeeling 3y ago
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• alephnerd 3y ago
  Depends on the region too. Part of my family is from a landowning/feudal caste (Chaudhary/Jatt and Pahari) that is traditionally Upper Caste but successfully lobbied to become counted as OBC/Lower Caste in order to avail affirmative action benefits. The Jatts side got reservation thanks to Congress [0] and the Pahari side got reservation thanks to the BJP [1] Edit: Lmfao this professor (Kuldeep Meel) is Jatt from Hisar/Jhunjunu side. Jatt is not lower caste. Ask my extremely casteist Jatt grandfather who uses Dalit caste names like Chamar, Gujjar, Kanjar, or Balmik as slurs. We became OBC because we burned shit down. The people who actually deserve some form of Affirmative Action didn't get any. [0] - https://indianexpress.com/article/political-pulse/haryana-khattar-govt-congress-jat-edge-civic-polls-8605087/ https://indianexpress.com/article/political-pulse/haryana-kh... [1] - https://theprint.in/opinion/security-code/reservations-for-kashmirs-paharis-meant-to-help-them-but-it-could-start-new-fires-instead/1155178/ https://theprint.in/opinion/security-code/reservations-for-k...
  • grad_ml 3y ago
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    • alephnerd 3y ago
      Eh Sri Ganganagar Meel biradari de siga? Those guys are an elite Feudal Family (they're related to the Jakkhars in neighboring Fazilka Punjab, who have been MPs and MLAs for that area since the 1970s).
    • pexabit 3y ago
      pretty sure he would have posted his jee score if he got in without quota
      • alephnerd 3y ago
        To be fair, getting in even with the Quota is extremely difficult. If difficulty without the quota is a 10, difficulty with the quota is more like a 9.7. If you were Forward Caste and rejected from CSE@IITB only because of a Caste Quota, you statistically would have ended up at CSE@IITK or EE@IITD, which has no meaningful difference. Belittling people who attended top programs on caste quotas is lame and mean.
• isanjay 3y ago
  I worked in 3 different companies (Hyderabad, Bangalore) in South India and did not see any evidence of caste discrimination. Or even people talking about discrimination in office. While I did see discrimination in college, which was in a rural town in South India.
  • dilawar 3y ago
    Pizza delivery is also casteless!
  • awintr 3y ago
    You wouldn’t necessarily unless you were looking for it
  • petesergeant 3y ago
    > I worked in 3 different companies (Hyderabad, Bangalore) in South India and did not see any evidence of caste discrimination Are you of a member of a discriminated-against caste? If not, it may simply be it wasn't visible to you.
    • soligern 3y ago
      It doesn’t work like that. This isn’t like racism where differences are immediately superficially apparent. You need to have conversations bordering on light interrogations to determine who is what.
      • petesergeant 3y ago
        That is in contrast to the article, which says: > Typically, one's surname (last name) is a giveaway and most Indians can reasonably identify someone's caste based on the last name
        • isanjay 3y ago
          That only applies to Northern part of the country. In south each state has it's own language and there is no way an outside state person can know your caste without asking
• thriftwy 3y ago
  So my wife is from a shipyard town in Russia which refitted that air carrier ship for Indian navy. So at times they had a lot of Indian citizens in town. I remember some of her acquaintances, working at child care, discovered that some of Indian kids shun other ones based on Caste, and promptly made them all do kids' dances holding hands with each other.
  • skavi 3y ago
    Just curious; why were there children at all? Surely they weren’t on the carrier?
    • thriftwy 3y ago
      Accepting a huge warship, learning to use and service it is a multi-year affair involving a lot of people, who in turn have families. So they had to acclimatize to the near polar circle White sea experience.
• ppsreejith 3y ago
  Reading the attachments, the data seems to be recent (except for IIT bombay?) and includes assistant, associate, and tenured professors. Surprising that almost 175 of the 180 faculty members are from the "forward castes" (~30% of population) vs 5 (1 obc, 4 sc, scheduled caste) from the remaining 70%. Could also be due to academia skewing older? (i.e reflecting past biases)
• helf 3y ago
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• 911e 3y ago
  This caste problems continue in the US, instead of leaving behind such ridiculous biases it becomes a part of an US company… https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/googles-caste-bias-problem https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/googles-caste-bias-pr...
  • banshiram123 3y ago
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    • timmytokyo 3y ago
      California is about to pass a caste discrimination ban [1]. [1] https://www.reuters.com/world/us/california-moves-closer-historic-caste-discrimination-ban-2023-08-29/ https://www.reuters.com/world/us/california-moves-closer-his...
  • AlbertCory 3y ago
    Since this is about Google, where I worked: > The Google spokesperson said that caste discrimination has “no place in our workplace and it’s prohibited in our policies.” I can testify that Ads was very heavily Indian, much more than the general employee percentages would predict. I don't know if it still is. Sridhar Ramaswamy (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sridhar_Ramaswamy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sridhar_Ramaswamy) probably had something to do with that. From informal observation, IIT was a very common alma mater for them. Yet, within the SmartASS team in Ads, a huge percentage of the engineers were Canadian. I worked in the office right next door to them for a while. What does this tell you? People tend to refer their friends and give good recommendations to people they know. A Canadian is more likely to know other Canadians. So is that "discrimination?"
    • za3faran 3y ago
      I wonder how that sits with the diversity and inclusion directives that are everywhere now. Maybe they turn a blind eye when it suits them, or use other teams to offset the difference.
• wtmt 3y ago
  The caste system in India is layered like onions. The author says he was born as OBC (Other Backward Classes), but that's not the lowest in the overall scheme. SC (Scheduled Castes) are considered lower in the hierarchy. ST (Scheduled Tribes) are considered even lower (there are variations across states and regions, so please take this with a pinch of salt). While the atrocities and punishments by "upper" caste people on "lower" caste people continue, even OBCs oppress SCs and STs quite badly, sometimes along with other "upper" caste people and sometimes by themselves. [1] It's a sad fact that the oppressed themselves don't understand it well enough to avoid oppressing others. If they could get together and lift each other up, things could be very different (or at least not as bad as they have been and are). [1]: Searching for news on atrocities and punishments on "dalits" would yield many results from as recent as a few days to long ago in the past.
  • rollcat 3y ago
    > While the atrocities and punishments by "upper" caste people on "lower" caste people continue, even OBCs oppress SCs and STs quite badly [...]. This is the step 1. in ensuring any oppressive system continues to be supported by a majority / critical mass of people, who are themselves subject to oppression: make sure there's someone even lower than you, on whom you can unleash your frustration.
    • alephnerd 3y ago
      The issue is OBC (Other Backwards Castes) was invented as a populist measure in 1992. After Independence, Affirmative Action/Reservation was created so Dalits and Nomadic Tribes who were traditionally outcastes in South Asian society could be integrated into society. Yet, in the 1980s-90s, Agrarian and Feudal Caste politicians like Mulayam Singh Yadav (Yadav), Lalu Prasad Yadav (Yadav), Chaudhary Charan Singh (Jatt), Bal Thackarey (Maratha), YRS Reddy (Reddy), etc began pushing to expand Affirmative Action to include those castes that are traditionally Feudal Lords/Zamindars and oppressed Dalits and Nomads. When this expansion began in 1992, every single non-Dalit caste saw that if they could lobby hard enough, they could also be give guarunteed Affirmative Action for college admissions, government jobs, welfare, etc. This is why even some Brahmin majority castes like Paharis were given Affimative Action by being treated as an OBC or Scheduled Tribe.
• biogene 3y ago
  This whole idea is completely wrong, in my opinion. You first need to demonstrate why your sampling model/methodology (collection of top50 NA CS departments) will lead to an error-free way to establish a discrimination type mechanism of selection. There is a near absence of people of South east asian origin in the NFL, but I don't think the NFL is doing so on discriminatory grounds. The end result is under-representation, but the underlying mechanism is not one of malicious discrimination by the talent scouts. The point is, lets discuss evidence of discrimination rather than a weird "this can only be possible with discrimination" argument.
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  • sulam 3y ago
    So you're saying the Indian caste system is well partitioned with respect to capability for tenure-producing work across a wide range of disciplines taught in IIT schools?
    • biogene 3y ago
      I'm pointing out elementary flaws in the methodology. As such the article wasn't convincing for me, and this is my feedback.
  • klyrs 3y ago
    Elephants do not exist, so there could not possibly be one in this room. Instead, let's self-soothe with talk of flaws in common elephant-detection methodologies, because that will reassure us that the room is elephant-free. Nevermind the pervasive smell of elephant shit.
    • biogene 3y ago
      I don't feel bad in point out flawed arguments or articles. Its up to the author to take the feedback for what it is, or discard it.
• soligern 3y ago
  Honestly I think this is majorly overblown. Having lived in both India and the US and being in my late 30s, I’ve never seen caste come up in any conversation even once. That’s tens of thousands of Indian people at the very least. Feels like this person is hyper aware of his caste and seems to take steps bordering on paranoia.
  • username135 3y ago
    There we have it. It's a non issue so let's move on folks.
    • turbohz 3y ago
      Works on my computer!
  • whalesalad 3y ago
    The unfortunate side effect of being subjected to this sort of insanity from a young age. That conditioning is very hard to shake off.
  • daveguy 3y ago
    Just curious, what caste were you born into?
  • flownoon2 3y ago
    The author says that: 1. OBCs are estimated to comprise 40-45% of India's population and 2. Exactly one out of 180 CS faculty members across five IITs belongs to OBC category Those two facts alone make it sound like a pretty big deal to me, even if it hasn't been a part of your experience in India. Or do you think he is wrong about those numbers?
    • soligern 3y ago
      Historically and culturally the higher castes are more educationally oriented so it wouldn’t be surprising. The caste system is rapidly breaking down but only for about the last generation. I presume it’s going to take time for representation within college professors being one of the most erudite fields. On the other hand, there is tremendous representation within the government, judges, police, teachers, civil servants, engineers etc. Modi the PM is an OBC, the president is also OBC. A very large number of politicians are from lower castes.
• mrhether 3y ago
  Have you considered expanding this research to other fields or perhaps collaborating with sociologists to further study this systemic issue?
• banshiram123 3y ago
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  • crop_rotation 3y ago
    Caste based reservations in the private sector will be the end of any chance of India becoming a more prosperous nation. In public sector, the reservations are not limited to getting a job, but the promotions as well. In some public sectors, the promotion schedule gets accelerated basis caste. Sure, a lot needs to be done for a more equal society where everyone has the same opportunities, but private sector reservation is not it.
    • hef19898 3y ago
      Yes, because history showed us that equal societies, compared to centemporary pears, fare muchuch worse than those discriminating. Or rather not.
      • crop_rotation 3y ago
        I am not getting your point, if you were making any. Regardless of what history shows, almost everyone will agree that we must have equal opportunities for all people, for a humane society.
        • hef19898 3y ago
          Including the civil sector? Enforced by law, if discrination isn't going away by itself? Yes, I am all for that!
      • kaycey2022 3y ago
        Equality is the prerogative of the government. Why do you want equal share in someone's private property? This is what reservations in the private sector mean. Someone takes all the risk, and works their ass off to establish a business and you come in with demands of equality in what someone else has made.
• adolph 3y ago
  I see OBC mentioned here many times but never defined in comments: The Other Backward Class (O.B.C.) is a collective term used by the Government of India to classify castes which are educationally or socially backward. It is one of several official classifications of the population of India, along with General castes, Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (SCs and STs). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Other_Backward_Class https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Other_Backward_Class The caste system in India is the paradigmatic ethnographic instance of social classification based on castes. It has its origins in ancient India, and was transformed by various ruling elites in medieval, early-modern, and modern India, especially the Mughal Empire and the British Raj. Key terms: * Varna, meaning type, order, colour, or class are a framework for grouping people into classes, first used in Vedic Indian society. . . . * Jati, meaning birth, is mentioned less often and clearly distinguished from varna. There are four varnas but thousands of jatis. . . . * . . . [C]aste is derived from the Portuguese word casta, meaning "race, lineage, breed" and, originally, "'pure or unmixed (stock or breed)". . . . https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caste_system_in_India https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caste_system_in_India
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• User23 3y ago
  What’s the hypothesized reason why American universities are evidently discriminating against OBC persons? To my knowledge most Americans know little to nothing about caste, few of us can reliably tell caste from name, and even if we could we wouldn’t care.
  • tptacek 3y ago
    The subtext is that other people of Indian descent are doing the discrimination. So far as I know, nobody asserts that non-Indians are aware of caste, or could possibly identify caste from names.
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  • pexabit 3y ago
    there is absolutely no evidence universities are discriminating against OBCs and the guy who wrote this post does not present any.
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• awintr 3y ago
  Isabelle Wilkerson’s book, Caste, really opened my eyes on this subject. Highly recommend for Americans looking to learn about our own caste system.
• silentsea90 3y ago
  Just as India is large and complex, so is everyone's experience. 59.5% of IIT seats are reserved for backward castes - that is HUGE in a nation full of students competing for the 40% seats available for the general category. The entrance exam score gap between reserved and general is massive (numbers are public) and it shows in their relative academic performance. One could make an argument that the Indian Government should step in earlier (early - middle school up to high school) by funding better education to reduce the academic gap between students from backward castes and the rest. The author here if anything points to the effect of poverty/poor education in one's early years as opposed to there being a systematic campaign to exclude backward castes in academia esp in the west where hardly anybody understands the caste system. I can't speak much to academia in India though.
  • raincom 3y ago
    No one wants to talk about the giant elephant in the room: reservation system vs. competence. Go to any govt office: the chief of some division is incompetent, some low-level clerk does the heavy lifting. Of course, this low-level clerk happens to be from non-reserved category, as both recruitment and promotions in the government are driven by reservations. Why people (both reserved and non-reserved) send their kids to private schools, techno-schools, residential-schools, IIT-schools even in small towns, small villages these days? The whole education system from primary to all the way to universities is failing: incompetent teachers abound. There was a time Indian politicians used to send their kids to colleges in Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai, Culcutta. Now, these politicians send their kids abroad right after 12th grade, as they are not impacted. The malaise in the Indian education system is so deep: getting a job in the govt is a way to 'correct historical wrongs'; if so, why these teachers (beneficiaries of this correction) don't send their kids to these govt schools? Ask, why these people look for the best doctors for their care? Maybe, it is time to destroy IITs as well by forcing the reservation system on the faculty recruitment (equality of outcomes). That way, we can achieve the common denominator from primary to IITs. People with means (importantly politicians and intellectuals who defend reservations) can send their kids abroad for undergrad B.A/B.S, whereas 99% people are stuck with systematic malaise in the whole education system.
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• b215826 3y ago
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  • aildours 3y ago
    Complete bs. >Caste-based surnames are extremely uncommon in South India (20% of India's population), and it's not even a recent thing. No, caste-based surnames are uncommon among some upper caste communities. A significant chunk (Gowdas, Reddys, Nairs etc.) have surnames strongly linked to castes. And what you might refer to being a "recent thing" is having a western style surname at all. >FWIW, as someone who has spent considerable time in Indian academia, this article reeks of BS. No one cares about your caste in Indian academia. The languages you speak, the part of India you come from, etc., cause a bigger divide than caste. I've also spent time in Indian academia (and left it, for unrelated reasons) and can say that caste matters a lot, in a very insidious way. Respectfully, if you can't tell that Bulsara is a Gujarati surname (which means it could be a Hindu, Parsi or a Muslim surname, so may not even be linked to a caste as is the case with Freddie Mercury), then you may not know enough to comment on caste. >How exactly did the author find their castes? Perhaps try reading the article? He has even linked the RTI responses if you doubt him so much.
    • b215826 3y ago
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      • Ar-Curunir 3y ago
        Did you read the RTI response? There’s no reservation for upper castes, yet the vast majority of faculty in all of the RTI response are upper caste
        • b215826 3y ago
          .
      • aildours 3y ago
        > I can assure you that the vast majority of upper-caste people here don't use a caste-based surname anymore. Oh, I don't need assuring for this, this was the point I was making! Basically, some south Indian upper castes use their father's first name as their surname. And this in itself is a strong signifier that the person is from the upper caste! And yes, some surnames like Bulsara are linked to a place, some are neutral like Kumar, or some are rare enough to not signify caste unless you really know. So what? Even now, a large chunk of the Indian population uses caste-linked surnames, and it is one way they get discriminated. This is the point he makes when he says "Typically, one's surname (last name) is a giveaway". > RTI responses will only tell you the number of candidates who were hired through caste-based reservation. No, the RTI responses that he has linked is for the "breakdown of faculty members in the respective category of reservation..." (see the linked pdf for IITD, for example), not if they were hired through caste-based reservation. The category of reservation being information that every Indian citizen is asked to provide in government forms.
• ae_throw 3y ago
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• raincom 3y ago
  Even though RTI queries to major IITs reveal that almost all faculty comes from un-reserved category, one needs more evidence (than this RTI data) to show that caste discrimination occurred. If there is an opening for two faculty positions in the IITM CS department esp in machine learning and AI, if 20 people are applied, two are selected, and two happened to be from un-reserved category. Does it prove caste-discrimination? Well, look at the profiles of twenty candidates and see their research record and also academic pedigree, see whether one can pick up two candidates from reserved category (that is, SC, ST and OBC). If one can show that, yes, indeed caste-discrimination is occurred: both candidates A (reserved category) and B (un-reserved category) are excellent both academically and research-wise, only B is chosen, yes, one can say that the committee should have picked A. Btw, I am not a product of IITs or any elite institution in the West/East. So, I am of opinion that best candidates should be picked up irrespective of one's caste. Sometimes, what is 'best' can be under dispute: for instance, a UCLA Ph.D with many publications in STOC/FOCS is picked up over a CMU Ph.D with many publications in tier-2 conferences. Again, what is tier-1, what is tier-2, etc are driven by the CS community, not by the so-called upper-castes from India. Same goes for pedigree: why Ph.D students from top-tier CS departments have better shot at getting faculty jobs than those from tier-2 institutions? Why CS people from American universities have better shot than those who got Ph.D from IIT Ropar/Tirupati? Again, it is community-driven, not by upper castes.
  • rhaway84773 3y ago
    It may not prove caste discrimination during the hiring process (I’m not sure that’s even claimed by the author). It does however strongly suggest and maybe even prove the existence of caste discrimination at a societal level. Why are the “best candidates” so disproportionately upper castes? That’s not a trick question. We know that the upper castes have suppressed lower castes. You may want to argue it doesn’t exist today, but the data very clearly show even if that’s true, the historical impact of that discrimination on the lives of people living today is high.
  • 542458 3y ago
    Even if the delta was the result of a lack of candidates from disadvantaged castes, to me that suggests that the discrimination already happened earlier, weeding out the disadvantaged castes before they could even become qualified candidates.
• intrasight 3y ago
  UToronto alum myself. >as recognized by the constitution of India So you have a racist constitution. That's too bad. I hope Indians are striving to fix that. If you move the the US or Canada, please don't bring your racism with you - we already have enough of our own.
  • unoti 3y ago
    I haven't read the constitution of India, but perhaps the reason it's codified there is for affirmative action?
    • momirlan 3y ago
      so you have to classify one as "backward" in order to help the person ? what kind if democracy is that ?
• jktj 3y ago
  My sister who is pursuing PhD is from OBC. She is doing from one of the best colleges on earth. Really proud of her!
  • alephnerd 3y ago
    Congrats to her!
• momirlan 3y ago
  India will not get anywhere meaningful as long as this institutionalized discrimination persists. "backward", really ? are we in the 21st century ?
  • elil17 3y ago
    Indian English is not the same as American English. As I understand it, "backwards" means "disadvantaged" in this context. Perhaps you should prepone learning about English dialects.
    • momirlan 3y ago
      sorry, not American here. "backwards" means the same thing in any other type of English. I will "prepone" it... lol
      • howinteresting 3y ago
        What exactly is your point then? It's just another word for "disadvantaged", "underprivileged" or "oppressed".
        • lucb1e 3y ago
          And it just happens to have a more commonly known negative meaning? They could have picked disadvantaged or oppressed, instead, for that acronym. I had little-to-no idea about this system until today and I'm not even a native english speaker, but all the same it seems curious to me that this word choice is just a coincidence...
          • howinteresting 3y ago
            Who could have picked those terms? OBC is a term of art used in Indian politics [1]. The author didn't exactly choose that term. And OBC is Indian English, which is one of the most common varieties of English spoken worldwide. I think it's really weird when people say "carpetbagger" in American politics, definitely more weird than OBC. And don't get me started on the racist origins of "grandfathered in" or "eenie meenie miney moe". [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Other_Backward_Class https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Other_Backward_Class
• WesternWind 3y ago
  It's always interesting when folks tell me that some form of discrimination based on categorical prejudice isn't that bad, or that they haven't seen it themselves. Personally I think the amount of discrimination should be zero, and that any level of categorical discrimination any person experiences is unacceptable. And that's not even getting into the systemic effects from past discrimination on family wealth.
  • hayst4ck 3y ago
    > Personally I think the amount of discrimination should be zero > any level of categorical discrimination any person experiences is unacceptable. These two statements contradict.
• varunpant 3y ago
  self inflicted wound that became a blog post. Stop playing Victim card. Modi PM of India is an OBC, so is the CM of UP.
  • alephnerd 3y ago
    Ajay Bisht/Yogi Adityanath is Thakur/Pahari Rajput
  • mrg3_2013 3y ago
    yeah, I felt the same
• moralestapia 3y ago
  Phew, what a post. I am at University of Toronto right now. I have only been here for some months but I have seen enough things to get a sense of the "politics" of the place. Also, I've been in many of the world's top universities (Caltech, Cornell, KAUST, Oxford, Stanford, UNAM, and some others with less pompous names); either studying, visiting, working, w/e. I've been doing this for close to 20 years now. I know a lot about what academia is and how it works behind the scenes. With that said ... University of Toronto is, by far, the most amicable, egalitarian and open academic environment I've ever had the chance to be in. I have several Indian friends I've made during my stay, and not a single time has the issue of caste come up to relevance. Caste doesn't have anything to do, at all, with how this particular University chooses their faculty members. I know OP is not directly (or is he?) accusing UofT of taking part on this, but someone reading this could easily get that impression since 1) he's using his academic page to publish this "opinion" and 2) he states: >I had begun to mention references to my caste in Facebook/Twitter threads in the past two years. I was, however, not ready to publicly declare it until <I received tenure (in bold letters)> as it seemed too risky. So, to all other readers, I can assure you that caste had absolutely nothing to do with OPs election/non-election as a faculty member and I really wanted to set the record straight on what actually is a really nice place that treats all of its members with dignity and respect.
  • kristianp 3y ago
    > I have several Indian friends I've made during my stay here, and not a single time has the issue of caste has come up to be discussed. I'm guessing it's not discussed at great length and not discussed with non-Indian people at all unless you brimg it up.
    • moralestapia 3y ago
      If you're trying to hint at some "it happens all the time, it's just hidden from public view", it doesn't. Non-Indians literally don't care, and very (very) few Indians actually do (at least in Canada).
      • 3y ago
• aildours 3y ago
  Consider reading [1] (also linked in OP) for a detailed article about a very talented lower caste person who gets hired at IIT Kanpur, only to be met with overt caste-based discrimination and harassment. You'd find it hard to claim caste-based discrimination doesn't exist after reading it. On a perhaps unrelated note, the author is Manindra Agarwal, who you may know as the A in the AKS primality test. [1]: https://kafila.online/2019/04/10/the-saderla-story-courage-in-the-face-of-violent-prejudice-manindra-agrawal/ https://kafila.online/2019/04/10/the-saderla-story-courage-i...
  • rramadass 3y ago
    https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37333418 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37333418
  • cscurmudgeon 3y ago
    Also consider reading that caste violence is also directed at upper castes from lower castes. It is not a one sided thing. Left-leaning ruling party politicians in a state have shamefully called for a brahmin (upper caste) genocide. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caste-related_violence_in_India https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caste-related_violence_in_Indi... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Brahminism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Brahminism https://www.deccanherald.com/india/dmk-spokesperson-supports-periyar-s-call-for-killing-brahmins-subramanian-swamy-moves-ec-1116752.html https://www.deccanherald.com/india/dmk-spokesperson-supports...
  • alephnerd 3y ago
    Yep. Indian and Indian Diaspora academia can be toxic. I remember hearing stories about a professor at a T10 CS Program who'd only give RAShips to people from the exact same subcaste community as him. There are plenty of issues with overt and covert toxicity among the South Asian community.
• mikrl 3y ago
  How do foreigners / non-Hindus fit into the caste system? Are there caste equivalent attitudes towards Arabs, Euros, East Asians and so on? Or from a different angle, Muslims, Christians, irreligious, etc. Or does the framework not apply to those outside of the Hindu community?
  • rramadass 3y ago
    They were all called Mlecchas - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mleccha https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mleccha It should be obvious that the above is merely a historical note nowadays and is no longer valid.
  • soligern 3y ago
    It mostly doesn’t. Historically there have been lots of mass conversions to other religions the first one being Buddhism in 600BC. Buddhism came about primarily as a response to Hindu orthodoxy and the caste system.
    • hef19898 3y ago
      Muslims so, despite being not covered by India's caste system, are heavily discriminated against so. A situation not helped by decades of war with neighboring Pakistan.
    • fuzztester 3y ago
      >Buddhism came about primarily as a response to Hindu orthodoxy and the caste system. AFAIK, it did not. It came about from the Buddha's teachings, which were not about caste, but about suffering and its cessation via attaining nirvana (but I am not an expert on Buddhism; we only learned some about it in school). My guess is that, instead, later, many people may have converted to it, maybe some due to orthodoxy. I am talking about olden times. In recent times, neo-Buddhists definitely may have converted due to the caste system. I have read something about that earlier. See Dr. Ambedkar.
      • soligern 3y ago
        I can go into great detail on the back and forth between Hinduism and Buddhism, mostly surviving as dueling literature for centuries. I would prefer you just look it up though.
• mrg3_2013 3y ago
  I have never heard or felt anyone talk about caste in my 25 years in US. I work with both academia as well as industry.
  • deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  • adjav 3y ago
    They may not have talked about it to you, but that doesn't mean they didn't talk about it at all.
    • mrg3_2013 3y ago
      Exactly how made-up issues are created. Vocal minority fallacy
  • usr8new 3y ago
    In the US, caste is mostly a made up issue. Most 95% Indian Americans are upper caste or rich land owning OBCs (like the professor who wrote this blog). Who exactly are they discriminating against then? Lot of grifters like Equality Labs have made this issue in US bigger than it seems. Most Indian American kids probably don't even know their own caste.
    • mrg3_2013 3y ago
      Agree with you.
• amriksohata 3y ago
  [flagged]
• testfoobar 3y ago
  How do hookup/dating/wedding apps work in India? What sort of granularity about caste is disclosed? What is expected? What precision of caste classification can be inferred from name/occupation/hobbies/location/appearance? Has someone built a NN classifier for caste? Could such a thing be built?
  • cududa 3y ago
    Someone could claim to build something like that, but it's going to be designed with the biases of the creator. What is your goal of building something like this?
  • mavelikara 3y ago
    The popular site matrimony.com has sub-sites for each caste. See the listing at: https://www.communitymatrimony.com/homepages/community/morelinks.html https://www.communitymatrimony.com/homepages/community/morel.... Many of these are based on caste.
• primitivesuave 3y ago
  I was born in India and moved to the United States when I was very young. One of the other Indian-American kids asked me what my caste is after hearing my unfamiliar last name. At the time, I hadn't even heard of caste, and didn't realized what kind of parenting environment creates a 7 year old (who doesn't even live in India or speak the language) to question the caste of another Indian in the first place. After school, when I asked my mother about my caste, she refused to tell me anything about it. "We left that silly system behind in India, and we're not bringing it here."
  • quadrifoliate 3y ago
    For what it's worth, I think your mother's attitude is shared by the vast majority of Indian-Americans, and even first-generation Indian immigrants like me. In India, there are egregious things reminding you about it, i.e. literally every government form ever -- but in the US it's reasonably easy to ignore and forget about completely unless you go out initiating conversations about it, or are unlucky enough to run into someone like your friend. I have had a ton of both Indian-American and Indian immigrant friends in the US, and have had zero conversations with any of them that involved discussing caste.
    • dmn322 3y ago
      As a white guy: I met one guy who was brahmin and was bragging about it and trying to explain to me that the caste system is good.
    • primitivesuave 3y ago
      This has been my experience as well- 99% of Indians outside India don’t know and don’t care. If anyone has any doubts the system is still very much alive in India, just visit the ghats of Varanasi where even in death (i.e. cremation) the castes are kept separate.
    • flangola7 3y ago
      It's on government forms?
• pierat 3y ago
  I know this is India, but caste discrimination isn't limited to only there. Cisco has an ongoing case against California over caste discrimination. https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/calif-scraps-caste-bias-case-cisco-engineers-company-still-sued-rcna79434 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/asian-america/calif-scraps-cast... Weirdly enough, the EEOC doesn't forbid that type of discrimination, but the courts might include that.
• ghotli 3y ago
  I hope this comes across as me being merely ignorant of the situation on the ground in India but I do have a question. I've seen caste based discrimination here in America first hand. It's gross and I have absolutely no patience with those participating in it. If I were to go to India with this attitude, would I be met with compatriots that also have zero interest in putting up with it? Is there a reason that such a backwards obviously oppressive system persists to this day in 2023? Why don't people just change their names to the caste they want to be Apologies, I'm a privileged American that can't begin to imagine putting up with even a moment of it personally. I know it's not so simple but it's a simple way to ask.
  • AmIDev 3y ago
    Name is not the only thing that gives away one's caste/religion. For example, my ear being pierced gives away that I am a Hindu. The specific dialect I speak gives away where I belong from, which statistically brings me to 2-3 castes. The food I eat(e.g. I eat chicken but not pork) or the festivals I celebrate will give away the rest.
  • dakial1 3y ago
    That's a good question. But as this is a way of maintaining social privilege and the people in power are the privileged ones, I imagine there is little effort in actually changing the system. They will say it's terrible etc, but no real actions will be taken. Can someone from India confirm/refute my hypothesis?
    • wobbly_bush 3y ago
      Two points - legally, caste based discrimination is illegal. From a cultural aspect - cultural changes are much slower in non-western countries. For example, compare how quickly the culture around marijuana & same sex marriage changed in US, and the laws kept up. But similar change probably takes 10x longer in "older" cultures. As an analogy, the left wing party of India which is supposed to be liberal, opposed legalizing same-sex marriage[1]. This attitude extends to all issues of reform in the entire political class. [1] https://www.opindia.com/2021/09/377-decriminalisation-congress-party-stonewalled-process-for-years-supreme-court/ https://www.opindia.com/2021/09/377-decriminalisation-congre...
• rdtsc 3y ago
  How feasible is to change one's last name. Or are there other characteristics others can detect like accents, facial features, etc?
• haltingproblem 3y ago
  The Prime Minister of India is an OBC and he got there through lifelong membership in the RSS a supposedly brahminical org. His competence as a politician and leader is unquestioned. The President of India is a Tribal, which can roughly equate to the status of indigenous people the world over. Her speeches are legendary, especially the one where she presented the inequities of the Indian judicial system to the judges of the supreme court. Meanwhile the darling of the left world over is the heir apparent of the opposition party, Rahul Gandhi, who is half brahmin-half Italian Catholic, but has no chance at the premiership. What does one make of this?
  • mavelikara 3y ago
    > What does one make of this? From what you have written, honestly, your political biases.
    • haltingproblem 3y ago
      Facts are often problematic when they don't comport with your reality. Care to rebut the facts instead of resorting to ad hominem attacks?
• NoZebra120vClip 3y ago
  I recently read a scholarly treatment on the subject of sati and whether it was really as widespread and pernicious as the colonising Empire claimed that it was. The verdict was: no, absolutely not. Now I have to wonder about the caste system: this only came to the attention of outsiders and Westerners while the Empire was systematically destroying India, in terms of economy, morale, and unity. What would have happened if the colonisers had not invaded, left India intact, and the inhabitants left to their own self-determination? Would caste discrimination be noticed here in North America? Would the Indian government, untainted by Western influences, be trying vainly to stamp it out and overcompensate with affirmative action and quotas? It really makes you wonder.
• screye 3y ago
  As a fellow OBC, I am not sure I like the idea of reclaiming caste. The author wrote his post from an inspiring standpoint, so my comment does not come from a place of criticism. His achievement is worth celebrating on its own grounds. ____ It's been 6 years for me in the US, and no one has asked me my caste. Even in India, the only time someone could have inferred my caste, was when someone indirectly asked my university JEE (SAT) scores in my first few weeks of freshman year. My scores were as high as 'general' (upper class) candidates, so they'd quickly assess me as 'one who deserves his spot here'. Still, I was pretty transparent about my caste status. Afterall, I was one of the lucky few who'd never been discriminated on caste. Hell, I didn't know I belonged to the umbrella term 'OBC' until I started filling out application forms for universities. Their inquiry, it was less so malice, and more so a sense of unfairness about a system that was supposed to be strictly meritocratic. But a few weeks side-by-side in a dorm made everyone intimately aware of the poverty of the lowest class. Soon, no one would dare think that the barely-English-conversant SC/ST, who came from a town without running water, was on the same level playing field as them. There were admittedly a few grifters and abusers of this system. All castes were equally bewildered by that group. The Indian-American diaspora in the US remains untarnished by caste (Can't comment on Canada). I make this as both of statement of faith, anecdotal personal experience and a statically aligned truth seeker. OBC is an artificially created term from less than 100 years ago. The communities have nothing in common, except a tag of underdevelopment forced onto us. The vast vast majority of Indians in the US are upper caste and the vast majority of tall NBA players had access to protein growing up. SC/ST communities and many poor OBC communities are backwards because their problems begin at nutrition, K-12 schooling and cultural emphasis on lower-income professions. By the time you make it to freshman year of college, you have mostly risen past the burden of your caste. This also means, that trying to increase visibility of the community at the highest levels, does diddly-squat for those grappling with crippling poverty and the worst of caste discrimination. Leaving outrage-driving topics like IQ, discrimination and generational trauma aside for a minute, vast statistical gaps within communities can still manifest due to emergent properties of systems converging to their nearest stable state. Caste discrimination is terrible in lower-class India. People actively try to move beyond Caste in middle class India. Caste is unheard of in upper class India. And the upper-most caste of operates at the family level, deeming everyone from their own caste and otherwise to be similarly 'pedestrian'. American immigration policy ensures that only middle and upper class Indian can move to the US. This means that every Indian who arrives in the US, is preconditioned to want to move past caste.
• umvi 3y ago
  A lot of countries still have caste discrimination problems, not just India. Even in racially homogenous places like Japan, people still figure out how to discriminate each other (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burakumin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burakumin).
• janiman21 3y ago
  [dead]
  • mmmmmbop 3y ago
    I know very little about the caste system, but it does strike me as odd that only 1 in 180 professors is from a group representing 50% of the population. It becomes even more suspicious if there's a quota for admissions as you say. At some point between admission and tenure, there seems to be a great filter. How do you explain that, if not for discrimination?
    • vGPU 3y ago
      Not so much deliberate as just being a matter of supply, from what I understand. > “teachers and mentors specialising in science are rare in the rural high schools attended by these students, especially Adivasis,” Sonajharia Minz, a computer scientist and vice-chancellor of Sido Kanhu Murmu University in Dumka, was quoted as saying.
      • mmmmmbop 3y ago
        That would make sense, except it was mentioned elsewhere on this thread that there is a 50% quota for OBC people at IITs. Are you saying that OBC are so far behind their peers at the time of admission that only 0.6% (1 in 180, as mentioned in OP) of those 50% manage to catch up academically? That's really hard for me to believe.
    • newusertoday 3y ago
      Does it also strikes you odd that asians represent far more percentage in IT jobs than their representative population? it can be explained in number of ways, mostly immigrant population, self selected population that is privileged to have money to come overseas, culture of emphasis on education than rest of the population etc. So while striking odd part is correct. Assuming that only explanation is discrimination is incorrect in my opinion.
      • 3y ago
• helsinki 3y ago
  Who cares? Why don't you ask how many professors in the Ivy League grew up in Appalachia?
  • sanderjd 3y ago
    Lots of people are interested in such questions.
• 1024core 3y ago
  Logic would dictate that OBCs would be a superset of SCs. And in his RTI requests you indeed see several SC professors in these departments. So why did he exclude SCs? I guess it doesn't make for as big a click-baity headline then?
• kotaboys 3y ago
  I know him personally. His family is pretty affluent, his uncle is/was a MLA from the state of Rajasthan. So by no mean he is just another guy. This guy is so privileged that something happened to his exam admit card then he went to Collector's office and yelled at him (on his own account). Any Indian here would know, what it entails/means. I wonder if got in IIT Bombay on the OBC quota. Is he salty because he did not get faculty position at IIT Bombay. I heard he is/was coming to UT Austin. Look at the following numbers, and you will realize how discriminated Mr Meel is. Category : Cutoff Score required for IIT (out of 100) Common Rank List :90.7788642 (Brahmins, upper castes which Ycombinator hates) Gen-EWS:75.6229025 OBC-NCL:73.6114227 : Mr Kuldeep Meel (The caste he suggests is discriminated) SC:51.9776027 : You'll see multiple comments here saying how badly they get treated by the system ST:37.2348772 --same--- PwD:0.0013527 -- same---- Dang, can you please not delete it. It's a fact, may be unpleasant for few.
• airocker 3y ago
  I am willing to bet the author can walk into any IIT as a professor.
• KorematsuFredt 3y ago
  I would like to point out that author is a liar and dishonest. He claims he is "OBC" which is not really a caste but rather a legal classification for affirmative action. Author's name is Meel, which indicates he is actually from the upper caste named Jats who historically have been landlords, kings and such. No one considered Jats as OBC until very recently in 2016 where this dominant caste members caused massive riots and street violence to demand such legal classification so they could benefit from affirmative action in government jobs. This is literally like the thieves from San Fransisco calling themselves victims of capitalism after robbing local Macy's.
  • ridiculous_leke 3y ago
    Caste classification is a big sh*t show. For example, Rajput is supposedly an upper caste, but by just changing it to "Rajput Bhamta" and bribing some officials one can get classified as "Vimukta Jati" in Maharashtra (which has tons of benefits at). I wouldn't be surprised if such lapses in the regulations have been abused in the past.
    • rhuru 3y ago
      Correct. In fact a lot of castes got SC/ST status because these names had some spelling mistakes when the clerks wrote it down. For example when a clerk read out to another the list of STs, there was one name called "Bhil Meena", the clerk who as writing it down heard it as "Bhil, Meena" as a result Meena which is actually a pretty powerful caste is ST even today where as Bhil Meena is still fighting for that status.
• HDMI_Cable 3y ago
  I’m the descendant of Indian immigrants, but is someone who grew up in North America, speaks English as my first language, and is very westernized—I wouldn’t even consider myself Indian to any respect, except for my heritage. I’ve never experienced caste discrimination (through I think I come from a high caste). But, I recognize that my experience is likely different, and probably slanted by my caste status in comparison to recent Indian immigrants. I was wondering if any other Indian diaspora or Indian immigrants to North America could chime in with what they’ve experienced: have you faced any caste discrimination?
  • vijucat 3y ago
    I'd reply to you but my caste only talks to DisplayPort, USB-C, or higher. HDMI cable, pfft... It's a joke, people, based on our friend's username.
  • rramadass 3y ago
    You might find the link to a study done by Carnegie Endowment on Indian-Americans here useful - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37333418 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37333418
• hnxx 3y ago
  I work with some Indian colleagues, and when I heard something about the caste system, I decided to look up some of my colleagues' names. I found that most of them come from higher-ranked castes, while a few are from lower-ranked ones. However, I can confidently say that all of them excel in their jobs. I hope that both the Indian people and the government can take more steps to promote equality. The current situation is unfair to those from lower-ranked castes and a huge waste of human potential.
  • rramadass 3y ago
    >I hope that both the Indian people and the government can take more steps to promote equality. The current situation is unfair to those from lower-ranked castes and a huge waste of human potential. It is exactly such simplistic viewpoints that allow various vested interests/grifters/charlatans to exploit/game the "Caste" issue in the US (and other Western countries). There has been more done to redress social inequalities (including caste-based) after India's independence than Westerners are aware of (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reservation_in_India https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reservation_in_India). In urban India it is not much of an issue since only the almighty "Money" counts and nothing else. You might also find the link to a study done by Carnegie Endowment on Indian-Americans here useful - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37333418 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37333418
• SandraBucky 3y ago
  I came across a decent journalism by "The Swaddle" recently, they discuss how upper caste social capital translates to merit in multiple arenas of life in India. They looked into IITs and made the following piece. https://theswaddle.com/the-deserving-and-the-damned/ https://theswaddle.com/the-deserving-and-the-damned/ This also sheds some light into state of startups and people behind it, as more than 60% Indian unicorns has at-least one of their founder from an IIT. https://restofworld.org/2023/iit-graduates-dominate-tech/ https://restofworld.org/2023/iit-graduates-dominate-tech/
  • rramadass 3y ago
    Thanks for the links, they seem pretty decent. However the phrase Correlation does not imply Causation needs to be kept in mind when reading these types of articles. You might find the links in my comment here also useful - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37333418 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37333418
• deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
• amankapoor 3y ago
  Any guesses why author begins by using the word caste, then uses the word category for a major part, and finally ends with the word caste?
• newusertoday 3y ago
  I find it odd that op thinks that his caste is discriminated against and also want to perpetuate this system by asking people from this group to reach out to him for help. This would just lead to replacing one group by another assuming this forms a positive feedback loop. So unknowingly op is as much a part of castist group as others. quite strange what do you guys think?
• rramadass 3y ago
  I am late to the party but people here need to understand this whole issue from a factual data-based viewpoint rather than from biased anecdotal articles. For Western audiences the article they should read is Social Realities of Indian Americans: Results From the 2020 Indian American Attitudes Survey by Carnegie Endowment - https://carnegieendowment.org/2021/06/09/social-realities-of-indian-americans-results-from-2020-indian-american-attitudes-survey-pub-84667 https://carnegieendowment.org/2021/06/09/social-realities-of... The above is the third in a 3-part series on Indian-Americans. Links to the other two are in the article and are worth reading. This whole (non-)issue in the US is entirely due to the shenanigans of "Equality Labs" of dubious origins/connections/research (the data is from a survey they did on Reddit!). See also: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37333207 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37333207
  • SandraBucky 3y ago
    factual data is an interesting term, I think this whole discussion is about how factual data at present fail to consider lack of opportunities some people faced historically. We must understand differences between Reporting and Journalism.
    • rramadass 3y ago
      >I think this whole discussion is about how factual data at present fail to consider lack of opportunities some people faced historically. No; see my other comment here - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37333669 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37333669 Westerners have no clue when it comes to the huge diversity existing in India on Social/Religious/Linguistic/Economic/Caste/Nutrition etc. parameters and how each is being "gamed" by vested interests both in India and abroad to suit their agendas. Hence "Equal Opportunities" does not guarantee "Equal Outcomes". The wikipedia page "Reservations in India" linked to in my above comment gives the details and finer points which i highly recommend reading in entirety to understand the complexities involved.
• sameerds 3y ago
  This kind of data is good to have. The post is admirably restrained for such a sensitive topic. But I would urge the original poster to reconsider the wording they used in the RTI query for the IITs. The query says "category of reservation", which is different from caste. People of all castes are allowed to apply in the "general category", while the other categories are "reserved" for their respective castes. The data would be much more reliable if the query said "caste declared by the applicant", and not the category they chose to apply in. EDIT: s/cast/caste/
• dynamicCast42 3y ago
  I have been a reader of this website since 15 years. I belong to one of the Poor states of India, one of the bimaru states. We are not eligible for Healthcare by government But we pay 4/5th of our incomes as taxes. My parents do not get any help, pension, from the government I have to use all my leftover income to pay for healthcare of my parents My children will be having to work 3/4th harder than anyone else for the same colleges seat, and will pay at least 7 times more fee for the same college seat. We never had any generational wealth, no farm lands. The politician have been Gaslighting us since decades that somehow we are the culprits, just for been born. The politicians have been ignoring, trolling, downplaying our concerns since decades in these 4 states. The politicians only want 70% of our income as taxes and we have to watch our parents die because we don't have money. We have to watch our children get injured on roads and use cheaper medicine because we don't have money leftover after paying taxes. Do not let anyone Gaslight, do not let anyone convince that you are the culprits just for being born. Just because something exists on the internet doesn't mean it's correct. Do not believe anything written on the internet unless it is vetted by all sided From the last 4 decades, 10% of the population has been deprived of 50% of the government jobs. Not all of That 10% doesn't may not have generational wealth. Do not let anyone convince you that that person is oppressed. Ask about the generational wealth, ask about the real estate owned by the family. A person who pays 7times fee for the same college will not own a house as compared to a person who pays 0 few for the same college. Do not let anyone convince you whose parents are government job holders that he/she is oppressed. The only oppressed people in India are those who pay their taxes and get nothing on return, have to watch their mothers die, have to watch their children heartbroken for scoring extremely good marks and still be denied admission.
• rldjbpin 3y ago
  i can only speak from my experiences, but this topic is not completely represented in the writing. first and foremost, discrimination in India still exists in some form to this day. however, it is not dominated or restricted by which family tree you are born into. as more people have (socio-economic and otherwise) mobility than ever, living in another region can sometimes feel like being an alien in your own country. despite that, i am proud of how far we've come along and (mostly) kept it together. i am not sure if we have a golden standard about correcting historical mistakes as a society. but what we are doing about this in practice does not seem like much either. among almost every aspirant starting their careers, you will hear about "reservation". while corporations elsewhere might have it as ensuring participation of all genders in their executive boards, it goes much deeper in India. what i disagree with it is the "equal opportunity" bit. instead of focusing on increasing accessibility to a better life for all, politically it has been weaponized to rather gatekeep who gets a better shot at what is there. although very different circumstances, it rings home to how it has been with the recent representation movement (hoping it does not step on too many nerves). after many generations under this approach, there is now a new reason for resentment between different parts of society.