{"id":8166,"date":"2017-08-23T19:06:19","date_gmt":"2017-08-23T13:21:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pahichan.com\/?p=8166"},"modified":"2017-08-23T19:06:19","modified_gmt":"2017-08-23T13:21:19","slug":"will-bollywood-add-the-fifth-one-to-the-ancient-indian-caste-system-as-nepotism-thrives-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/will-bollywood-add-the-fifth-one-to-the-ancient-indian-caste-system-as-nepotism-thrives-again\/","title":{"rendered":"Will Bollywood Add the Fifth One to the Ancient Indian Caste System as \u201cNepotism\u201d Thrives Again?"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"\"<\/a>Sunil Babu Pant\/Pahichan – A lot has been said and a lot has been written about the \u2018nepotism\u2019 in Bollywood since actress\u00a0Kangana Ranaut<\/em>\u00a0accused film maker\u00a0Karan Johar<\/em>, in the latter\u2019s own popular TV show, as \u201cthe flag bearer of Nepotism.\u201d The debate resurfaced again after a lame attempt at a joke at the\u00a0IIFA Awards<\/em>\u00a0landed filmmaker\u00a0Karan Johar<\/em>\u00a0and actors\u00a0Saif Ali Khan<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0Varun Dhawan<\/em>\u00a0in a social media mess.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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However I want look at the problem of \u201cBollywood\u2019s nepotism\u201d in light of a very ancient problem of South Asia: the caste system.<\/p>\n

First, let\u2019s look at the snapshot of how caste system may have evolved in India and Nepal:<\/p>\n

Nobody knows for sure when, how and why exactly the caste system that we find in India and Nepal today originated. The hypothesis is that the caste system was started as a division of society based on labor: the occupation. Caste system is a complex social dynamic among\u00a0Hindus<\/em>, comprised of\u00a0Jaati<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0Varna<\/em>.<\/p>\n

According to\u00a0Vedic<\/em>\u00a0period literature,\u00a0Jaati<\/em>\u00a0means a classification based on the way sentient beings are born.\u00a0Naya-Sutra<\/em>\u00a0states \u201cSamaanaprasavaatmika Jaati<\/em>\u201d or those having similar birth source form a\u00a0Jaati<\/em>. The\u00a0Shastras<\/em>\u00a0(Hindu holy-books) say\u00a0Jaati<\/em>\u00a0is creation of\u00a0Brahmaan<\/em>\u00a0(the creator-god or can also mean entire universe).<\/p>\n

All beings in the universe are classified into four\u00a0Jaatis<\/em>:<\/p>\n

1)\u00a0Udbhija<\/em>: sprouted from earth like plants, trees, vegetables etc.
\n2)\u00a0Andaja<\/em>: born out of egg like fish, bird, snakes, dinosaur etc.
\n3)\u00a0Jarayuja<\/em>\u00a0or\u00a0Pindaja<\/em>: born out of physical body like mammals, animals, humans etc.
\n4)\u00a0Ushmaja<\/em>\u00a0or\u00a0Swedaja<\/em>: reproduced due to ambient condition and temperature like insects, bacteria and viruses.<\/p>\n

Now lets look at the word\u00a0Varna<\/em>:\u00a0varna<\/em>\u00a0means one that is adopted by choice. While\u00a0Jaati<\/em>\u00a0is provided by God (or by Universe or by the nature),\u00a0Varna<\/em>\u00a0is our choice (or \u201cfree will\u201d perhaps). There are four major\u00a0varnas<\/em>:<\/p>\n

Shudras<\/em>\u00a0(Artisans and Skilled Workers) are the service providing people to the rest of the society.
\nVaishyas<\/em>\u00a0(Farmers, Merchants, and Business People) are the productive class of the people.
\nKshatriyas<\/em>\u00a0(Warriors, Police, and Administrators) are the nobility, the protectors of society.
\nBrahmanas<\/em>\u00a0(Priests, Teachers, and Intellectuals) who provide education and spiritual leadership.<\/p>\n

In modern-world-term, if we try to fit these ancient class system then the planners, thinkers and educators are the\u00a0Brahmanas<\/em>; strategists, executors and people working with all kinds of security agencies are\u00a0Kshatriyas<\/em>; people who make sure all the distribution of labor and goods through trades and commerce are\u00a0Vaishyas<\/em>\u00a0and the people providing all kinds of services can be classified as\u00a0Shudras<\/em>.<\/p>\n

If we understand the caste system like this, then I have become all of these four caste-classification during my lifetime, sometimes becoming\u00a0Brahmana<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0Shudra<\/em>\u00a0at the same time and so on. The\u00a0Varna<\/em>, originally, was not fixed based up on familial-lineage rather, for a healthy society, it definitely was and should be flexible; in other word: freedom to choose one\u2019s profession or occupation was allowed. There might have been other reasons how caste became fixed heritage and legacy for some and curse for others, but one thing is sure that \u201cthe nepotism\u201d must have played a big role to turn the flexible\u00a0Varna-byabastha<\/em>\u00a0(caste-system) into fixed family lineage. Thus, eventually, caste-system became an invisible monster to lock\u00a0Sudras\u00a0<\/em>(the service providers) into\u00a0Dalit (<\/em>untouchables)\u00a0<\/em>and\u00a0Brahmins<\/em>\u00a0never give up being\u00a0Brahmin (<\/em>co-called higher caste)<\/em>. Thus, individuals of the society who, perhaps, were free to choose their own occupation, and change if they wished later in the life, according to their own traits and interests or retired all together due to the age factor or health conditions, were stuck to adopt the occupation whatever their previous generations did for living.<\/p>\n

After nepotism was embedded into the caste system and it was now fixed into family lineage, several books such as\u00a0Manusmriti<\/em>\u00a0came into play to govern this caste system through Heredity, Caste Rules, Marriage, State Support and creating one of the ugliest things that humankind ever experienced. For example, making it impossible for\u00a0Sudras<\/em>(primarily service givers but considered untouchables later on) to become the thinkers and planners (primary jobs of\u00a0Brahmins<\/em>) and vice versa; impossible for\u00a0Vaishyas<\/em>\u00a0(the accountants and traders) to become the\u00a0Chetriyas<\/em>\u00a0(the strategists, executors, governors and security personals) and vice versa. Further divisions were added based on gender and color of the skin and dedicated festivals, rituals, food they ate, clothes they wear, natural resources they are allowed or not allowed to collect, marriage, sex and sexuality etc., were mandated based on this caste system.<\/p>\n

The primary reason must have been the fact that the families in ancient times (like today\u2019s most of the families) wanted their Knowledge\/ideas (Bramhanism<\/em>), wealth (Vaishyaism<\/em>)and power(Chetriyaism<\/em>) to be kept inside their families only; the skill, hard-work and service (Sudraism<\/em>) gets sidelined. Similarly, Bollywood\u2019s big players seem to operate believing that keeping money inside the family is the best way to protect material-intellectual-emotional assets and also keep the next generation in check.<\/p>\n

But one thing the caste system remarkably failed and still failing is, to stop people abandoning caste system altogether to become a hermit, no matter what caste they were born or belonged.<\/p>\n

While Bollywood may or may not develop their own \u201cbook of nepotism\u201d to govern it; yet through unwritten yet thriving rules like heredity, pay-rules, Bollywood-dynastic-support-system, the nepotism is already well governed in Bollywood. So the question is: will the \u201coccupation of acting\u201d in a Bollywood movie be added as the fifth caste to Indian ancient caste system? Or has it already?<\/p>\n

Or will Bollywood manage to liberate itself from nepotism and be inspired to abolish the rigid-caste-system of India. Can Bollywood let people choose their occupation\/profession as they wish without prejudice, heredity, caste-rules, marriage and religious institution\u2019s interference?<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/article>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sunil Babu Pant\/Pahichan – A lot has been said and a lot has been written about the \u2018nepotism\u2019 in Bollywood since actress\u00a0Kangana Ranaut\u00a0accused film maker\u00a0Karan Johar, in the latter\u2019s own popular TV show, as \u201cthe flag bearer of Nepotism.\u201d The debate resurfaced again after a lame attempt at a joke at the\u00a0IIFA Awards\u00a0landed filmmaker\u00a0Karan Johar\u00a0and actors\u00a0Saif Ali Khan\u00a0and\u00a0Varun Dhawan\u00a0in a social media mess.<\/p>\n

However I want look at the problem of \u201cBollywood\u2019s nepotism\u201d in light of a very ancient problem of South Asia: the caste system.
\nFirst, let\u2019s look at the snapshot …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":8167,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[621,492,490],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8166","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-opinion","category-slider"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8166","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8166"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8166\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8169,"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8166\/revisions\/8169"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8167"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8166"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8166"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pahichan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8166"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}