Articles by Ramkrishna Mukherjee

The debate surrounding the relationship between caste and class is discussed here in the context of historical and contemporary perspectives in India, maintaining that what exists in India is caste in class, not caste per se or caste and class.

I P Desai and Sociology of India Ramkrishna Mukherjee In the four decades of pursuing sociology I P Desai examined a wide range of topics. The significance of his work lies not so much in the fact that he was more critical than his contemporaries but in the methodology he used. Whatever be the subject he dealt with he used the inductive analysis in the place of deduction. In his studies on the Indian family, he drew attention to the kinship network of family units instead of considering only their insular attributes of co-residence and commensality which was the valuation prevalent in the West, His enquiries on whether caste should be a basis for recognising backwardness are noteworthy for their rigorous research. He rejected the concept of caste as a unique or an intrinsic or a persistent phenomenon in Indian society. Examining the concepts of sanskritisation and westernisation, I P Desai found that the 'new elite' on the contrary, arises out of an amalgam of the two processes.

Ramkrishna Mukherjee Aryanisation did not come to Bengal till as late as in the fifth century AD, Even then, the people of Bengal went under the Brahminical way of life because of the accompanying economic domination and privileges. The Hindus of Bengal, however, stayed consolidated by their Bengali affiliation and were correspondingly alienated from the Hindus in the rest of India. The bulk of East Bengal, which was riverine, was not easily accessible from the west and it remained distinct in its creeds and cults.