Jaipur • New Delhi • Bengaluru • Guwahati • Kolkata
All studies on social mobility have been confined to upward
mobility available to underprivileged groups, particularly the lower castes.
During the fifties, sixties and seventies a number of sociologists – Srinivas
(1952), Cohn (1955), Bailey (1958), Kalia (1959), Mahar (1960), Chanana (1961),
Ramratan (1961),Could (1961), Barnabas (1961), Patwardhan (1973), Shyamlal
(1973) and a few others – had reported, through their research studies, the
change in the social structure and mobility pattern of the scheduled castes and
scheduled tribes in the various regions of India. The concept of
‘Sanskritization’ employed by Srinivas has been popularly researched and
critically examined in India but not its reverse ‘Asprashyeekaran’.
The book, therefore, studies the downward mobility in India, where
groups and individuals of upper castes or tribes broke away their affiliation
with the parent group and culturally incorporated themselves, formally or
legally, into the lower castes, acquiring altogether a new low caste identity –
a phenomenon hardly reported by social scientists in general and sociologists
and social anthropologists in particular.
Introduction
2 Origin of the Bhangis:
An Untouchable Caste
3 Asprashyeekaran
through Ages
4 Conversion of Upper
Castes into Lower Castes: A Process of Asprashyeekaran
5 High Caste Convert
Bhangis of Rajasthan
6 High Caste Converts of
Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh
7 Acquiring a Dalit
Identity: Downward Mobility of Some Upper Castes of Rajasthan
8 De-Sanskritization of
Upper Castes into Bhangis
9 Contextual Trends and
Processes: Impact of Jains
10 Impact of Maharshi Naval
11 Conversion to Jainism
12 Social Mobility Among
India's Bhangis
13 Conclusion
14 Reflections of the
Press
Shyamlal is an
eminent sociologist who has held notable positions in academia. He served as
the Vice Chancellor, Patna University, Patna and Jai Narain Vyas University,
Jodhpur. He was also the acting Vice Chancellor, University of Rajasthan,
Jaipur. Earlier in his career, he held the position of Professor and Head,
Department of Sociology, University of Rajasthan, Jaipur. He also held the
esteemed role of Chairman, Drafting Committee, Ambedkar Foundation, Government
of Rajasthan. Notably, he received the ICSSR’s Dr. B.R. Ambedkar National
Fellowship for both 2003–04 and 2004–05. He was also honoured with Lifetime
Achievement Award (2021) by the Indian Sociological Society at Mumbai and
Jagatguru Ramanandacharya Award (2023) at Varanasi. Professor Shyamlal is a
prolific writer with over 24 books and more than 50 research papers to his
credit, published in various journals and edited volumes.
