The Altered Distance: State–Community Relations and the Rise of Representational Politics in India

The objective of this article is to provide a framework that productively explains an aspect of the caste dynamic in India in the context of the Modern Indian State. Two specific focus areas are caste conflict and the competitive representation politics that has become prominent in Bharat in the 20th century. The latter has spread itself to every single modern sphere – legislature, jobs and education. While conflict is more pronounced in the post-independence era but has its roots in the pre-independence era. In particular, they are rooted in the transformations brought about in the colonial era by the colonial powers through the colonial administration. The era, powers and administration called out as colonial separately is to emphasise the time period, intention and instruments, each of which evolved in mutual stimulation and dependence.

The critical enterprise of the article is to arrive at a framework/model of Indian society that has the ability to characterise the following with the minimum ambition of explaining caste conflict and competitive representation politics

• The pre-British era configuration of the Indian society
• The British era transformations of 250 years
• The post British era and contemporary conflict

The next three articles will apply this framework to explain the following as a consequence of the colonial dynamic

• The journey of Jatis that experienced elevation in the colonial period
• The journey of Jatis that experienced suppression in the colonial period
• The combined journey of Jatis in the post colonial/post independence period

The framework is crafted as a higher level of abstraction seeking to represent the Indian social dynamic independent of time. However, the abstraction has the minimal purpose of representing the flow of time starting from the colonial to contemporary times, with an ambition to be timeless, as an additional one. The immediate need to explain the 20th century might bring its own limitations, as social realities of the past are not a focus for explanation.  Nevertheless, this first article is a preparatory note and does not provide detailed explanatory accounts of the 20th century yet, that will be part of subsequent articles. For each specific context and period, separate articles will be crafted subsequently. Nevertheless, the final section of this article will make some key observations across time periods and about specific time periods just in order to establish the veracity of this note and give a glimpse of what might come in subsequent articles.

So far such explanatory models have been built with a western lens. This is now common knowledge and this article makes no analysis of such explanatory models. It is arguable whether they productively explain all the realities of all phases. Nevertheless, they are mainstreamed and have held sway harvesting several problematic situations. This essay does not claim to present a comprehensive, complete model on our terms but makes an attempt to build one that potentially explains chosen realities such as caste relationship/dynamics and representational politics (Eg., reservation) – the chief concerns of this essay.

The Structure of this Article

The article opens by setting out its central aim: to construct a framework capable of explaining caste dynamic/conflict and competitive representation politics in modern India by situating them within a long civilizational trajectory spanning the pre-colonial, colonial, and post-colonial periods. It proposes a high-level, time-transcending model rooted in Indian Knowledge Systems.

The core of the framework is introduced as a “5-Set Network” model of Indian society, where each Jati is conceptualized as a node defined by Performances, Consumption, Aesthetics, Rituals, and Sacred Energy. The article posits that every Jati possesses a unique and shared subsets (with other Jatis) of this 5-Set. Consequently, Jatis form a complex, interdependent network. This structure enables the article to posit and account for enabled autonomy, stable livelihoods, cultural distinctiveness, and a balanced social order in the society over millennia until the colonial era.

Using this framework, the article outlines the socio-cultural implications of the model: communities possessed exclusive professions, secure identities, intergenerational excellence, and a strong sense of self-worth. These conditions collectively ensured psychological security for individuals, further reinforced by a Rajya (State) that remained equidistant from all communities, guided by Rajadharma and Dandaniti, and refrained from interfering in internal community dynamics.

The discussion then transitions to the foundations of psychological security – anchored in stable livelihood (Artha), identity and legacy (Kama), fairness in state relations (Dharma), and access to sacred life (Moksha). This equilibrium, the article argues, was fundamentally disrupted during the British colonial period.

A detailed account of this Yuga-Pallata (epochal transition) during the colonial period follows. The article identifies five major colonial drifts – exploitation, social reconfiguration, industrial change, knowledge paradigm shift, and modernity – which led to disintegration of communities, loss of livelihood and identity, and erosion of the 5-Set alignment.

The article further highlights the disproportionate impact of knowledge systems, historiography, and industrialization in reshaping social hierarchies and opportunities. Finally, it argues that these disruptions altered the traditional equidistance from the State, giving rise to competitive representation politics—manifested in struggles over education, jobs, and political power – as communities seek to restore lost security through proximity to the modern State. In this exposition, the article marks eleven conjectures as key milestones and makes a case for their further exploration.

I. A High Level Model of the Indian Society

Communities are the most striking feature of Indian society. They are referred to as caste today and kula/jati etc., in the past. While to a non-discerning eye (especially trained in the modern/western perspective), India appears to be a hotch-potch of Jatis ordered into a complex hierarchy by Varna, Indian scholars have long contested such a position. At the very least, at a visible level, Jati-s engage with each other in multiple ways and there are complex, longstanding relationships between them that cannot be reduced to a simplistic hierarchy. This lends the overall society to be viewed as an intricate Network whose nodes need to be characterized through Jatis.

Here is a model of Indian society constructed to present an explanation of phenomena chosen for exploration in this essay.

1. Indian society is a Network where each node can be deemed as a Jati. Jatis consist of several small sub-units that could be called Kulas or Clans or a collective of families that are tightly bound with some pursuit which this essay characterizes later. This too is simplistic. Kulas to Jati relationship is not this planar but for the purpose of this essay – we can make this reduction and move further. On the one hand, the non-planar nature of this relationship is irrelevant to the concerns of this article. On the other, its nature is complex and any explanation here would be distracting and out of context. Kulas could be deemed as significantly more autonomous and Kulas within a Jati having a strong interdependence.
2. Jatis consist of five foundational characteristics from which its other features are constructed. Let us call this the 5-Set of a community.

• • Performances (Pursuits and Excellences)
  • Consumption (Needs)
  • Aesthetics (Elevation from Basal Instincts)
  • Rituals (Divine and Social Connections)
  • Sacred Energy (Devata ensemble and Sacred Source of Energy)

The nature of Aesthetics and Rituals is to elevate Performances & Consumption and anchor them in the Sacred Energy for sustenance and balance.

(These five foundational elements of a community are drawn from Panchakosha/Purushartha perspective, very briefly explained at the end of this document)

[Refer to this Article for further elaboration: Srishti-Sthiti-Laya: The Position Of Soundarya In The Bharateeya Jeevana Drishti – Indica Today]

1. The 5-Set of Every Jati has two subsets. One of them represents the Node in this Network and another an Edge.

• A unique subset that distinguishes this Jati from any other Jati
• A shared subset through which it relates itself with other Jatis in their adjacent vicinity.

The shared-subset results in a network of Jatis. The shared subset represents EDGEs between two nodes ie., Jati ie., An Edge in this Network is nothing but a 5-Set that is shared between two Jatis. In other words, an Edge is an ‘intersection’ of the 5-Sets of two Jatis. Thus all edges of this network are shared subsets of the 5-set between two nodes (Jatis) in the network. This makes the 5-Set of a Jati node a union of its ‘unique subset’ and all ‘shared subsets’ with all other Jatis with which it has a relationship.

1. Performances and Consumption shaped the ‘professions’, ‘skills’ and ‘material culture’ of a Jati. ‘Aesthetics’ and ‘Rituals’ represented their ‘culture’. ‘Sacred Energy’ determined the nature of their divine pursuit. Each shaped the other with a near 5*5 relationship between them. Every Jati had the autonomy to shape/compose their aesthetics, rituals around their performances/consumption, binding it to the sacred energy. The composition here refers to a natural alignment between performances/consumption with aesthetics/ritual with sacred energy. The quality of this composition is measured by the synergy between the 5-Set of the Node. This is explained in detail in Appendix-2. Thus, an autonomous life emerged around the main profession. The quality of this composition determined the health of a Jati. The autonomy was put to its best creative use in designing the 5-Set composition.
2. This design was capable enough to absorb all kinds of shocks – internal/external – and keep its movement towards the balance/dynamic.

• • Natural dynamics within a Jati node resulted in sub-groups of a node moving to a different node or forming another node as a consequence of performances morphing, new performances emerging, relationships with another node becoming stronger and so on.
  • Famine/natural calamities in their extreme pushed people to migrate. Groups that migrated got absorbed into the Jati network of the new ecosystem, either retaining their Jati configuration, or altering it partially or sometimes completely expressed through their 5-Set.
  • Internal invasions from within the Indosphere hardly made any difference to the ground society.
  • Pagan invasions from outside merely altered Jatis but Abrahamic invasion significantly altered the 5-Set configuration often resulting in greater disturbance and setting a longer course of the restoration of the network into a new configuration. This article characterizes the nature of the disturbance brought about by British invasion and colonization. The framework is capable of describing other disturbances, but that would be the concern of other downstream articles not part of the plan as of now.

Conjecture-1: A community represented by its 5-Set elements are sufficient to explain every other dimension of the society such as professional pursuit, skillset, social organization, external engagement, political endeavour, cultural organization and so on. All these are a unique combination of chosen elements of the 5-Set of a community – Performances, Consumption, Aesthetics, Ritual-Complex and Sacred. A complete model of how the 5-Set determines different socio-political-cultural features of a community would be the scope of another article. This article recognizes this as a conjecture to use this productively within this article.

Thus, the society is represented by two concepts – unique-subset and shared-subsets together resulting in the 5-Set. These are drawn from the first principles of Indian Knowledge Systems (IKS) as described in the Appendix. As a consequence, all associated conflicts explained in this article earn their explanatory power from IKS.

II. The socio-cultural implications of the 5-Set Network

A critical feature of Indian communities, represented by the 5-Set Network, is that it ensured that each Jati had an exclusive pursuit as a function of its exclusive ‘Performances’ and ‘Consumption’. More specifically, this meant the following for each Jati.

1. A dominant profession/function that determined the main livelihood pursuit of the Jati. It is referred to as the dominant profession as it always contained within and coexisted along with multiple related professions around the main pursuit. Thus within weaving as a profession, bards who retained the Jati Purana of the weaving community coexisted – rather ensured that sustenance and survival of sufficient bards to ensure the seamless flow of a cultural legacy.
2. A unique culture as a result of the autonomy to shape the 5-set, aesthetics in particular, around the main profession. While the 5-set consists of performances, consumption,  aesthetics, ritual-complex and sacred energy – they are not static elements. There is a continuous change with time. Any change in one element, requires a potential realignment of the other four. A micro-change in an element may not need/result in any change in the other four. When an element drastically changes, it may force a chance in one or more of the remaining four. For instance, if performances change drastically, rituals and aesthetics may need to change drastically to keep the source of sacred energy unaltered. Nevertheless, there is a unique engagement between these elements that shapes a unique culture for a community which is also continuously evolving. While aesthetics makes the most visible, tangible, apparent part of the culture – all 5 elements contribute substantially to the actual unique culture of a community.
3. Guaranteed livelihood – The dominant main profession of a community has largely remained without competition within a region of strong economic engagement. Consequently, communities have lived and evolved with a sense of absolute ownership of the main profession and with a sense of security of guaranteed livelihood resulting from this ownership.
4. Self-contained life (largely) within the community – The autonomy of shaping performances, consumption, aesthetics, ritual-complex, sacred energy largely by their own volition, while not being insulated from the world, meant that a large part of an individual’s life was spent within the virtual boundary of a community. In the parlance of Indian Knowledge Systems, the Satva-Rajas-Tamas and IchchaShakti-GnanaShakti-KriyaShakti of human beings found sufficient expression within the community resulting in minimal interaction outside the community (represented by the Shared 5-Set). This reduced the complexity of inter-community conflict, if any, and a minimum number of institutions outside the community was sufficient to oversee and keep inter-community interaction healthy. It would be the subject of another article to explain this dimension wholesome.
5. Secure Identity/An Exclusive position in the society as a consequence of the unique 5-Set. While the ritual-complex and sacred energy anchored identity at the spiritual end, the performances/consumption/aesthetics anchored at the material end. In particular, performances as the biggest expression of Rajas, shaped and anchored identities. There are two ways in which this shaped a unique and secure identity. On the one hand, a community was guaranteed with unique 5-set – performances in particular. On the other hand, the collective of shared-sets of a node also crafted another unique dimension of a community in terms of its relationship with other communities, in particular in what way it ‘served’ others. Thus, exclusivity resulted in identity which is a natural cause for a community to feel ‘secure’ within the larger society. It could be conjectured that a sense of self-worth is the consequence of an exclusive identity/position/contribution that brings its own security to individuals in a community [Conjecture-2].
6. A sense of excellence and a legacy of excellence owned within the community – The consequence of owning a main professional pursuit and associated pursuits is the opportunity to exclusively excel in a pursuit. This exclusive excellence means a generational flow of excellence, the creation and owning of a legacy of excellence. This in turn shapes a shared sense of responsibility towards that legacy and deeper purpose for life.
7. Exclusive value in the society as a consequence of the Shared 5-Set. All the above mentioned factors results in an exclusive value for a community in the society. This in turn resulted in a strong sense of belongingness and association with the larger society beyond the community. While the community network represents the general belongingness of the society – it is specifically reflected on the three dimensions Desha, Rashtra, Rajya. Desha is a region consisting of many Kshetras (living places), Rashtra was the collective of society in a kingdom and Rajya the royal organization that ran the kingdom. The history of India shows that Desha was more permanent. Rashtra and Rajya experienced a larger dynamic of change in Kaala and Vartamaana scale. In these three dimensions a community experienced different value based on the exclusive value it brought to the table through its Shared 5-Set.
8. Lastly, it is conjectured that a definite self-worth was a consequence of all of the above points explained. That root of this self-worth was the 5-set. The material outcome of the 5-set resulting in dominant profession, unique culture, guaranteed livelihood, self-contained life, secure identity, ownership and legacy of excellence, and exclusive value brought self-worth of significant weight to every community [Conjecture-3].

Such an arrangement ensured that the Jati developed a natural Varna-Fractal within.

• The main profession/function shaped a certain Varna of the community
• Diverse pursuits around the main profession ensured individuals with a different Varna orientation, according to their Svabhava, were accordingly engaged.

These characteristics brought in significant security and harmony to the society network. Of course, the objective is not to say that the network was always harmonious overall or within each Jati, and without any conflict.  But an aspiration and instrumentation for harmony was carved and configured respectively into the very design of the community network itself. This ensured natural restoration within the society when each time there was a fall [Conjecture-4]. This is another conjecture of this article which would be elaborated further in a subsequent article.

III. Rajya, Dandaniti and Jati

This section elaborates the relationship of a community/Jati with the Rajya/the State. From the standpoint of a comparison with modern society, a critical question is where do we place the Rajya – the equivalent of the modern State. Is the State within (or outside) this community network?

At this point, it is necessary to understand the distinction between Desha, Kshetra and Rajya – realities beyond the community.  The Desha (region) and Kshetra (living place) were certainly realities in between. The Desha is largely a cultural entity with different natural commonalities. Kshetra is a place where parts of a community had to live together in order to sustain a holistic livelihood. Desha and Kshetra are way more organic and were a composite of elements it constituted. However, the Rajya/State comes with a lot more man-made distinctions for governance. Its distinction is represented by two elements a) The nature of authority and governance b) The nature of relationship between community and society. In regard to this, India distinguished itself in two ways. Its authority was drawn from the philosophy of Dandaniti – the expositions of which can be found in Mahabharata and Arthashastra. Secondly, the Rajya placed itself firmly within the Society – the community network ie., the constitution of the society itself contained the Rajya itself. Thus, if community/Jati was the one crucial element of the society, Rajya was naturally another.

This section is an elaboration of this perspective of the distinction of Rajya in the 5-Set Network.

1. A distinguishing  feature of Indian Society in the context of the State (Rajya) was that one of the Jatis within the integrated 5-Set network was also responsible for the Rajya. Such a Rajya-Node in the 5-Set network became responsible for a subset of the overall civilizational 5-Set Network. Collectively, many Rajyas managed the complete 5-Set network with each having a consequential influence over many nodes. Often, nodes experienced influence from multiple Rajya-Nodes but chose one over the other. Conflicts were a function of the extent of difference in influence from multiple Rajya-Nodes.
2. Every Rajya-Node had a unique relationship with every other Node (Jati) within its Rajya. The distinguishing feature of the relationship with a Rajya-Node is that, at least theoretically, all other Nodes in the Rajya were (functionally), equidistant from the Rajya-Node ie., the State, within the Network [Conjecture-5]. This is an important conjecture with which this article proceeds.
3. The Rajya-Node did not seek to play a role in the function of the society ie., it did not seek any role in the internal function of any Jati. Its core role was focused on a) Security, b) Criminal Justice, c) Upholding social order represented by the Network itself and d) Welfare needs beyond that run by communities.
4. The Rajya-Node did not let any one Jati play a higher role in the administration than any other Jati. Carefully chosen individuals from each community played specific roles as aristocrats (for want of another word in English) in the administration as described by Mahabharata. Their powers were drawn from the concerns of security, justice, order and overflowing welfare and did not stretch to either drawing state power in favour of their communities and to alter the nature of any community.

Such neutrality of the Rajya-Node was not serendipity or accidental. It was driven by Rajadharma – sought by the society, formally articulated by thinkers and embodied by the rajas. Once a node in the network acquired a Rajya status a different code of conduct kicked in driven by Rajadharma. By definition, as Rajadharma Parva of Mahabharata puts it, the Raja was responsible for the Purushartha of all. The Purushartha of individuals required independence and non-intervention with respect to a community. Purushartha of an individual was drawn from the nature of a community and its function – especially its 5-Set – hence, kings did not seek to alter their course by any which way. This ensured that other nodes did not feel insecure about the possibility of other nodes in the network to have an excessive proximity with the new Rajya Node. Individuals from a community could have higher proximity with the state but nodes ie., communities were equidistant. Rajadharma achieved this not by an explicit dictate but by defining responsibilities for the Rajya  – maintenance of the existing community order was the responsibility of the Rajya. Thus, the distinction of a Raja was defined by how far away the state was in deciding the internals of a community.

More specifically, this dimension of Rajadharma is reflected by what Bheeshma says about  the Dandaniti’s purpose, once again in the Rajadharma Parva of Mahabharata (69th Chapter). The right application of Dandaneeti by a King results in all Varnas

• Following their Swadharma
• Avoidance of Adharma
• Being in their Swakarma
• Living fearlessly
• Living skillfully (Kushalapoorvaka is the Hindi translation given by Gita Press, Kushal requires Kaushalya)
• Perceiving security and protection of health
• Being within the boundary of their Maryada

It is important to note that society living skillfully is listed as an outcome of successful Dandaniti of a Raja. It is the consequence of Yogakshema being an objective of Dandaniti which in turn requires communities/individuals to live skillfully.

This emphasis on Swadharma of individuals was crucial in Kings not intervening/favouring/disfavouring communities or communities seeking a similar proximity with the State. Any intervention would alter the Swadharma of the community which flowed onto individuals. The last point is crucial as well. The boundary meant that Raja was within his/her boundary not entering into the realm of community affairs. The community was within the boundary not seeking to affect internal affairs of other communities and the Rajya-Node itself. As a consequence no community got to play a role in Rajyakarma any more than the other. Not that such attempts weren’t there but the society was configured to avoid, protest, push that back through a formal code of conduct represented by Rajadharma teaching [Conjecture-6].

IV. The Psychological Security of an individual/Jati/community

With this as the background, let us explore a few questions that are playing out intensely in our times. Let us begin by asking the question what brings psychological security to a human being in life. Given that Bharat has always anchored its life on a community organization of the society that may be a good starting point for this question. Does a good community life nurture a psychology for security in individual lives? This essay answers in the affirmative [Conjecture-7]. The essay both conjectures the same and presents an explanation.

The following elements of a community appear to be nurturing psychological security of an individual. This draws from the expositions in previous sections, especially the purpose of Dandaniti in Rajadharmaparva.

• The Security of Artha: a core profession that supports livelihoods being fully owned by the community with the following properties
  • Strong and Dynamic enough to support a host of other pursuits that cover a wide spectrum of Varna orientation within the community
  • Creating Dynamic Equilibrium within familiar circles through balancing opposites: Independence through interdependence, co-operation alongside competition and livelihood security with legacy excellence
  • An assured Present and Future through owned profession
  • A sustainable access to any resource that is needed for the above life

• The Security of Kama
  • A strong Identity in the larger society that is also Exclusive
  • A unique sense of the past with legacy whose narrative is shaped from within the society. This sense of the past is represented by both Poorva-Sooris (Heros) and important milestones/achievements/contributions, In ancient times, this was underscored in many ways – Jati Puranas in particular.
  • A unique presence/position in the present in terms of operation and contribution
  • A unique 5-Set that shapes a correspondingly owned sense of ‘Excellence’
  • Autonomy to shape most parts of life within the community – providing a sense of freedom, contribution and participation

• The Security of Dharma
  • An Equal Access to the State as a community – no other community has any more access than one’s own
  • An Equal Distance from the state as a ‘community’ – no other community has any lesser distance and hence a greater opportunity to shape the State’s behaviour

(Equal Access and Equal Distance could also be the same)

• The Security of Moksha (Sacred Pursuits): A Productive Ritual Life that ensured an independent access to Sacred Experiences

In all strife and change, across times, society has always strived to restore itself to the above configuration aided by the State. This could be represented across time too given in the table below.

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