WE THE PEOPLE OF INDIA
Caste, Civilization, and a Path to National Reconciliation
A Citizens’ White Paper
Introduction: Amidst claims of economic booms and GDP growth rates, allegations of violence against religions and castes corruptions etc the reality is that people of India are increasingly becoming polarized . The degree of hat redness is very high. It is time to rethink and correct the path. This is an effort to look into reasons why people of India should honestly and truthfully explore and understand why they should unite as one people not divide

1. Abstract
This paper argues that the people of India are the product of a long, complex history of migration, intermixing, and cultural fusion, rather than of any single “pure” race or civilization. It offers a distinction between the ideal of the ancient varna system—based on vocation and duties—and the later birth-based caste system, which hardened into hereditary hierarchy and produced massive social, economic, and moral harm to Indian civilization.
The document proposes a citizen-led framework of Confession, Pardon, and Reconciliation (CPR) to address the deep wounds caused by caste and related divisions. It outlines historical context, identifies how distortions of Sanātana Dharma and Vedic culture enabled hierarchy, and offers practical recommendations in education, law, economics, religion, and politics to re-center the moral core of Indian civilization around equality, mobility, and brotherhood.
The core thesis is simple:
If we accept that we are one composite people, and if we honestly confront the wrongs of the past without hatred or denial, we can rebuild India as a community of equal citizens—We the People of India—rather than as a collection of competing castes and sects.

2. Why a New Conversation Is Needed
India is at once remarkably united and deeply divided. Most citizens wish to remain one nation and feel pride in our civilizational heritage. At the same time, we are fractured along lines of caste, religion, region, language, and political affiliation. These fractures are not new; they have roots that stretch back centuries, even millennia, and they are constantly manipulated for short-term political gain. With massive advancement in communication, social media, press TV ,facebook, whatsapp etc forces attempting to decieve people with falsehood, for selfish gains, electoral victory have increased multifold.
Two parallel tendencies have become especially dangerous:
1. Denial and romanticization – claims that no serious injustices ever occurred within Indian society, that birth-based discrimination is a colonial or “foreign” invention, or that all internal problems can be blamed on invaders and outsiders.
2. Weaponization of grievance – narratives that reduce all of Indian history to victim–oppressor binaries, encouraging perpetual blame and resentment without a constructive path forward.
This paper proposes an alternative: a rigorous but compassionate reading of our past, which neither sanitizes oppressive structures nor demonizes any living group as a whole. This paper is written for ordinary and concerned citizens, not for any political party, religious institution, or ideological camp. Its guiding questions are:
* Who are we, really, in terms of ancestry, culture, and language?
* How did a flexible, duty-based social ethic (varna) degrade into a rigid, birth-based caste system?
* How did that system weaken India morally, intellectually, and politically?
* How can we heal the damage without replacing one form of hatred with another?
To answer these questions, we must look at archaeology and genetics, social and political history, spiritual traditions, and contemporary social realities. But above all, we must be willing to think freely and to speak honestly—without fear, malice, or partisanship.

3. Who Are We? A Composite People
3.1 Migrations and Mixing
Modern archaeology, linguistics, and population genetics converge on one broad conclusion: the peoples of the Indian subcontinent are the result of long-term mixing among multiple groups—indigenous populations and migrants from different directions and periods.[1]
* Early farming and settled communities developed in parts of the northwest and the Deccan.
* Urban civilizations such as the Indus/Harappan world (c. 3300–1300 BCE) emerged, with trade links stretching to West Asia and beyond.(Also:parallel, similar civilizations in the south like Kezhadi)
* Over time, groups speaking early Indo-Aryan languages entered and mingled with existing populations, just as other migrants—Persians, Central Asians, Greeks, Arabs, and others—arrived in later centuries.
While scholars debate the precise chronology and pathways of these movements, no serious research supports the idea of a completely closed India with no substantial inflows and outflows of people. Nor does evidence support a simple, one-time “invasion” narrative. The reality is more complex: waves of migration, intermarriage, conflict, and cooperation over millennia.
3.2 Dravidian, Indo-Aryan, and Beyond
In public debates, “Dravidian” and “Aryan” are often treated as rigid and opposing categories. Historically and scientifically, they are not racial boxes but labels linked to language families, inferred cultural complexes, and historical reconstructions.[2]
* Dravidian-speaking populations underpin much of southern, eastern, and parts of central India. Elements of Dravidian presence are also visible in the northwest in earlier periods. A vast majority of those presently called as Dalits, “Lower” castes and tribals living in North and northwest India are of Dravidian origin. Once scientists succeed in deciphering the ‘Indus Script’ the picture will become much more clear
* Indo-Aryan-speaking populations gradually became dominant in much of the north and northwest, blending with existing groups and giving rise to Sanskrit and the later Prakrits and modern Indo-Aryan languages.
* Additional strands include Tibeto-Burman speakers in the northeast and Austroasiatic-related groups in central and eastern India, along with historical inflows of Persians, Greeks, Arabs, Central Asians, and others.
3.3 No “Pure” Bloodlines
Given this long history, the idea of a “pure” Aryan, pure Dravidian, or pure anything in today’s India is biologically and historically unrealistic. Some communities may show higher proportions of certain ancestral components, but every major group bears the imprint of multiple streams. Dark-skinned groups in the north, fair-skinned groups in the south, and all variations in between testify to this complex mixing.
The healthy conclusion is not shame or competition, but pride in being a uniquely composite people. WE THE PEOPLE OF INDIA have inherited:
* Many physical types and phenotypes.
* Multiple language families.
* A wide range of ritual practices, philosophies, and spiritual experiences.
* All of the above have made us a highly enriched nation and community in the world
This plurality is our wealth. It should not be reduced to an argument over who is older or superior.

4. Languages, Scripts, and Mutual Enrichment
4.1 Tamil, Sanskrit, and the Fusion of Traditions
A great deal of emotion surrounds the question: Which language is older—Tamil or Sanskrit? For political purposes, this question is frequently weaponized. For scholarship, however, the issue is more nuanced.[3]
* Tamil is one of the oldest continuously attested classical languages in the world, with early inscriptions and Sangam literature bearing witness to a rich, pre-Vedic and non-Vedic civilizational stream in India now very strong in the south
* Sanskrit is the classical language of much of Vedic, Smṛti, Purāṇic, and philosophical literature in ancient and early medieval north India, with a sophisticated grammatical tradition epitomized by Pāṇini’s Aṣṭādhyāyī.
Both languages:
* Have deep roots, complex internal histories, and multiple dialects.
* Show evidence of mutual influence and contact, including shared vocabulary and structural borrowing over time.
* Have contributed to the formation of later regional languages—Dravidian, Indo-Aryan, and mixed.
The real story is not one of rivalry but of exchange and enrichment: Tamil, Sanskrit, Prakrits, Pali, and many regional tongues participated in a shared civilizational conversation.
4.2 Scripts and Literacy
From early scripts like Brahmi and its regional variants to Tamil-Brahmi and Grantha, the subcontinent developed multiple writing systems in which both Dravidian and Indo-Aryan languages were expressed.[4] Over time, these scripts evolved into modern forms such as Devanagari, Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada, Bengali-Assamese, and others.
This shared evolution underlines a key point: our civilization has always been multilingual and multiscript. No single language “owns” India; India owns them all.

5. Varna vs. Caste: From Ethical Ideal to Rigid Hierarchy
5.1 The Original Ideal of Varna
In the oldest textual and traditional memories, varna is often described as a functional and ethical classification, not a , birth-based ladder. Broadly, society was seen as consisting of:
1. Knowledge and teaching/preaching priestly roles : learning, spiritual guidance, counselling ,preservation of wisdom.
2. Governance and defense roles administration, law enforcement, protection from internal and external threats.
3. Production and exchange roles : agriculture, animal husbandry, trade, and commerce.
4. Crafts and labor roles : artisanship, construction, manual labor, technical skills.
In this idealized model:
* Duties (dharma) and qualities (guṇa) mattered more than birth.
* Knowledge was a responsibility, not a private asset.
* The priestly class was expected to live simply, refrain from wealth accumulation and political power, and serve as moral guides.
* The warrior class was bound by codes of courage, justice, and protection of the weak.
* Producers and workers were essential partners in sustaining society’s material well-being and were entitled to fair shares and dignity.
* These roles were not assigned as a birth based right or duty. Anyone was free to learn, improve skills and choose and fullfil a professuon of choice as a service to the community
* Society had a duty to the individual and individual had a duty to the socioiety; an ‘all for one and one for all ‘ concept. A pure DHARMA based living
This vision can be interpreted as a division of labor with mutual responsibility, infused with spiritual and ethical expectations.
5.2 The Historical Drift Toward Caste
Over time, especially as certain lineages consolidated land, office, and ritual authority, the varna schema hardened into hereditary, birth-based caste (jāti) hierarchies.[5] Several processes contributed to this abberation and corruptioon of the dharmic living system
* Monopolization of knowledge: Access to formal learning, scriptural study, and high offices increasingly restricted to certain birth groups. For example, those who were ‘assigned’ to do priestly/ teaching duties reserved their jobs for their offspring
* Land capture and patronage: As kingdoms formed, elites from priestly and warrior backgrounds accumulated land, revenue rights, and temple control even thogh by ‘definition they were not supposed to become owners of land
* Ritual ranking: A graded hierarchy of purity and pollution developed, with “untouchability” imposed on many communities performing essential but stigmatized work. They were branded as inferiors, Dhasas destined to servitude because of their sins in the previous births
* Legal codification: Some prescriptive texts (such as the Manusmṛti and later commentaries) were used selectively to justify birth-based status and harsh penalties, the practice on the ground varied by region and time.
The result was a system in which:
* Social status at birth largely determined one’s permitted occupations, marriage options, educational opportunities, and interaction with public institutions.
* A large majority of the population—today remembered as “lower” castes, Dalits, and many tribal groups—were kept away from literacy, political participation, and religious office.
* Internal divisions made collective resistance to injustice and external aggression weaker.
* The worst was the doctrine that advocated the theory and false teaching that serving the elite is a god given duty to the “lower” castes. Unable to get educated, read and think freely the ninety plus percentage of the population had no other option than to accept the “God Given” assignement to serve the less than ten percent warriors. kings priests and such elites.
5.3 Moral and Practical Consequences
The degeneration from an ethically conceived varna framework to a rigid caste regime inflicted profound harm:
* Moral: By denying equal human dignity, the system violated the very spirit of the civilization’s loftiest teachings about the oneness of life and the universal self.
* Intellectual: Generations of capable minds from marginalized communities were kept from education and leadership, diminishing the country’s collective intelligence.
* Economic: Talent was misallocated; hereditary constraints blocked innovation and social mobility.
* Political: Fragmented and hierarchical societies made it easier for internal elites and external powers to manipulate, divide, and rule.
* The self centered section among the “upper” groups and the. “elites” became lazy pleasure seekers corrupting the system and civilization exposing the country to invading externmal forces
This diagnosis does not imply that every individual from traditionally “upper” groups was complicit, nor that all “lower” groups were always powerless. History also records reformers, saints, scholars, kings, and commoners from all backgrounds who resisted oppression and imagined more just orders. But as a structure, birth-based caste worked to the systematic disadvantage of a majority.
It should also be stated that the dedicated section among the “upper” group contributed so largely taking nhatatha to outstanding place in the world intellectually and economically.

6. Sanātana Dharma and Vedic Culture: Ideal vs. Distortion
6.1 The High Ideal
At its best, the civilizational ethic known as Sanātana Dharma (often loosely equated with the “eternal way” or “perennial moral order”) expressed a remarkably universal vision:
* Unity of life: The cosmos as an interdependent whole; the same divine principle present in all beings.
* World family: The motto vasudhaiva kuṭumbakam—“the world is one family”—appears in classical sources and resonates across traditions.
* Balance of duties: Emphasis on dharma—right conduct—rather than on rights alone, binding individuals to society and society to individuals.
* Pluralism: Acceptance of many paths to spiritual realization; debates among schools were intense but usually acknowledged a shared search for truth.
These elements influenced not only self-identified “Hindus,” but also Buddhists, Jains, Sikh traditions, and regional folk religions. In many ways, India’s global reputation as a spiritual and philosophical center rests on these ideals.
6.1 The origin of Sanathana Dharma
The roots of Sanathana Dharma lay in the origininal pre vedic, pre arian indus harappa like civilization. Whether there existed a codification on those days may be disputable, in the absence of language records or inability decipher any available. But the inspiration for the Sanathana Dharma was the lived civilization of ancient Indus/ Harappa like Indian civilization . Same way ,the codification of the Vedas and vedic culture was the insprational life of the original Indian people alarge percentage of them being of Dravidian race. The migrating Indo arian community and others codified and enriched the Indian civilization making all the indians ‘authors’ of our culture and civilization before being poisoned with the birth based caste system
6.2 The Capture and Corruption of the Ideal
The tragedy is that segments of those entrusted with teaching and defending these ideals appropriated them to legitimize inequality. When priestly and royal elites:
* Insisted that birth alone determined spiritual and social rank.
* Denied education and temple access to large groups.
* Justified humiliation and exclusion as “divine will” or the result of past-life karma.
—they were not practicing the best of Sanātana Dharma but betraying it.[6]
Over centuries, the combination of:
* Scriptural editing and selective interpretation,
* Temple-centered hierarchies,
* Court politics and patronage,
* And a lack of broad-based education
allowed a distorted form of religion to become a cloak for caste power and social control. Some scholars call this drift “Brahmanism” in a critical sense—not to attack all Brahmins as people, but to highlight a system where a section of ritual specialists placed themselves outside and above the ethical norms binding others.
A crucial distinction must be made:
The problem is not that some individuals were born as Brahmins or Kshatriyas; the problem is that a section of these elite lineages abandoned their duties and misused their position for their selfish motives to entrench hereditary privilege.

7. Historical Episodes: Lessons, Not Weapons
To understand how social divisions weakened India’s resilience, we can look at selected episodes—not to assign endless blame, but to draw lessons.
* Mauryan synthesis: The partnership of Chanakya (Kauṭilya), a scholar-strategist, and Chandragupta Maurya, a ruler of non-elite origins, shows that when merit and vision override narrow birth status, India can build strong, inclusive polities. The Mauryan Empire, with its administrative sophistication and relative openness to diverse beliefs, remains a high point in ancient statecraft.[7]
* The end of Mourya empire conducted by a prioestlly class Shunga reinforced efforts to kill the reformist activities initiated by Buddhism that exposed the meaninglessness of cate system and highlighted the equality of men. It is worthwhile to note that the controvercial ‘ Manusmirthi was made on those days. It is also to be emphasized that except a very few mentions about caste system (mostly added and edited later) less than one percent of vedas endorse birth based caste system.
* Reform movements: The rise of Buddhism and Jainism in the first millennium BCE, and later Bhakti movements in various regions and languages, can be read as spiritual and social critiques of rigid caste hierarchies. These movements insisted on inner purity over birth status, and opened devotional practices to wider publics.
* Court intrigues and collaboration with invaders: Multiple periods saw internal elites ally with or capitulate to external forces to protect their own status. While details vary, a recurring pattern is clear: when elite solidarity mattered more than national solidarity, the broader society paid the price.
These episodes should be studied critically—using multiple sources, not films or folklore alone—but the broad pattern is hard to deny: division and status obsession weakened us.

8. Caste as Slavery of a Special Kind
Comparisons are often drawn between caste oppression in India and racial slavery elsewhere, such as in the Atlantic world. Each has its own history, but one disturbing fact stands out in the Indian case:
* In many slave systems, the victims never accepted slavery as morally justified; they resisted, rebelled, escaped, and preserved their dignity in secret.
* In India, large sections of the oppressed were taught that their low status was a divine decree or a consequence of past-life karma, and that patient obedience was a spiritual virtue.[8]
This internalization of hierarchy:
* Made resistance more difficult.
* Allowed birth-based inequality to persist for centuries.
* Spread even into communities that later converted to other religions, such as certain Muslim and Christian groups, where caste-like distinctions continue in practice.
The persistence of caste across religious boundaries proves that this is not merely a “Hindu problem,” nor is it a purely “invader-made” problem. It is a broader social disease that has infiltrated the entire culture.

9. Present-Day Politics: Denial, Polarization, and Missed Opportunities
In contemporary India, caste and historical narratives have become political tools:
* Some “Dravidianist” narratives reduce all history to a story of Aryan invaders oppressing original inhabitants, and treat all “upper” castes as uniform oppressors, ignoring internal diversity and the contributions of many individuals from those communities.
* Some “Hindutva” narratives deny or minimize the severity of caste oppression, or blame it entirely on foreign rulers (Muslim, British), and claim that ancient Hindu society was perfectly egalitarian.
* Across parties, leaders of all backgrounds have used caste and communal identities to build vote banks, rather than to dismantle injustice.
At the same time:
* Caste-based parties that began as movements for justice have sometimes drifted into corruption and dynastic politics, with limited transformation in the lives of the poorest belonging to their leaders’ own caste
* “Upper” caste, “forward” Christian, and “Ashraf” Muslim elites frequently maintain subtle barriers against Dalits and “backward” communities even within their own religious institutions—separate churches, separate cemeteries, informal endogamy.
The net result is a politics of deception and division in which:
* Historical pain is exploited rather than healed.
* The “average citizen”—from any background—remains vulnerable to economic precarity and social manipulation.
* Opportunities to fundamentally uproot caste injustice are missed.
* Hue and cry for reservation in education jobs and legislature is at all time high . The ‘forward’ castes organiize to oppose reservation as they are deprived of opportunities in education and jobs.Political parties using this struggle to create division using it as a tool to move people and groups in their favor
The failure here is not only of one party or ideology but of the entire political class, across spectrum and regions. The loss is fot the country and we the people of India

10. A Framework for National Healing: CPR
To break this cycle hatred and fight, we need a moral and civic framework that goes deeper than electoral strategies. This paper proposes CPR: Confession, Pardon, and Reconciliation.
10.1 Confession
Communities that historically benefited from caste privilege—including “upper” caste Hindus and equivalent elites in other religions—need to acknowledge honestly that:
* Birth-based discrimination existed and continues to exist.
* Access to land, education, administrative posts, and high ritual offices was unequally distributed.
* Many of their own ancestors (not all, but some) led,participated in or tolerated injustice.
This confession is not about self-hatred or collective guilt; it is about truth-telling as a foundation for trust.
10.2 Pardon
Communities that suffered—Dalits, “lower” castes, many tribal groups—minority religions are justified in feeling anger and pain. Yet, long-term hatred will only trap the country in cycles of resentment. At some point, they too must be invited to pardon, not in the sense of erasing history, but of consciously choosing not to punish the descendants of historical wrongdoers for the sins of their forebears.
Pardon is not asked in exchange for silence; it must be accompanied by real structural reforms and empathy from those with privilege. The hate cycle should end. The people of india should rise as one “We the people of India’ and move foraward.
10.3 Reconciliation
Reconciliation is the shared work of building a new social order in which:
* No child is denied education, opportunity, or dignity because of birth. Education, atleast to plus 2 level, should be made free and of highest standard and, even akind of, cumpolsary
* No community is stereotyped as inherently superior or inferior.
* Inter-caste and inter-community friendships, marriages, and collaborations are encouraged, not as a show but out of genuine belief in oneness of mankind.
Practical steps can include:
* Truth-telling forums and local dialogues moderated by trusted persons.
* Joint community service projects.
* Public apologies and symbolic acts from institutions that perpetuated exclusion (temples, churches, mosques, educational trusts).
* Celebration of role models from all communities who worked against caste.

11. Policy and Social Recommendations
The following recommendations are indicative and meant to provoke discussion. They assume that state policy alone is not enough; civic, religious, and cultural actors must all participate.
11.1 Education
1. Critical Social History in Curriculum
* Integrate multi-perspective history of caste, gender, and regional diversity into school textbooks.
* Include stories of reformers, saints, scientists, and leaders from all backgrounds who worked to unite people as one people of India.
2. Bridging Programs and Mentoring
* Set up mentoring systems and remedial programs jointly for first-generation learners from historically excluded communities historically ‘elite’ communities
* Train teachers to recognize and counter their own implicit biases.
* Include personal growth sesions for teenagers and highschool students using modern osychological methods (like transactional analysis, PAC etc)
3. Anti-Discrimination Codes in Schools and Colleges
* Enforce bans on caste-based bullying and segregation.
* Establish confidential complaint mechanisms with real consequences.
11.2 Reservation and Social Justice
1. Retain but Rethink Reservations
* Maintain affirmative action where evidence shows continuing disadvantage.
* Periodically update beneficiary lists based on multiple indicators (education, income, geography, discrimination markers) rather than treating them as static forever.
2. Graduated Exit and New Entry
* Families that have enjoyed sustained educational and economic mobility for two or three generations can voluntarily or gradually exit reservation categories, making space for others in deeper deprivation.
* Replace caste names in some administrative records with coded categories to reduce stigma while preserving remedial targeting.
* Encorage dropping surnames and lastnemes that reveal castes, like Nair, Namboothiri, Thakoor, Bhattacharya, Mishra etc
3. Support for Poor Among “Upper” Castes
* Design targeted scholarships and grants for genuinely poor children from forward communities, without diluting remedies for historically oppressed groups.
11.3 Religion and Community Institutions
1. Equal Access to Worship Spaces
* Ensure that temples, mosques, churches, gurdwaras, and other religious institutions do not deny entry or common seating on the basis of caste or community.
2. Inclusive Leadership Pipelines
* Encourage priesthood and community leadership training programs open to candidates from all backgrounds, subject to doctrinal constraints of each tradition but oriented toward inclusion.
3. Official Denunciations of Caste Discrimination
* Religious bodies can issue clear statements declaring caste-based exclusion a sin or adharma, backing these up with internal disciplinary measures.
* may be religios authorities should consider creating a new “SCRIPTURE’ as an adeendum – amendment- declaring discrimination as objectablle, and a ’sin’ towards God and man
11.4 Law and Governance
1. Strengthening Anti-Discrimination Law
* Ensure effective implementation of existing laws such as the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.
* Consider expanding legal frameworks to address discrimination in housing, private employment, and access to services.
2. Anonymous Stages in Recruitment
* Introduce “blind” shortlisting procedures in public recruitment where names, caste indicators, and addresses are temporarily masked.
3. Data and Transparency
* Produce annual district-level reports on education, employment, landholding patterns, and discrimination complaints, broken down by broad social categories.
11.5 Culture and Media
1. Responsible Storytelling
* Encourage films, TV, and literature that portray inter-caste solidarity, not just inter-caste violence.
* Critically examine and update popular narratives that glorify uncritical elite power.
2. Positive Role Models
* Highlight scientists, artists, teachers, soldiers, and social workers from all backgrounds who embody national unity and ethical courage.
3. Fact-Checking History Claims
* Establish independent, non-partisan fact-checking bodies to scrutinize public claims about history that inflame hatred.

12. A Civic Pledge: “We the People of India”
At the everyday level, transformation begins with a simple change in how we see one another. A draft civic pledge could be:
I will not judge another Indian’s worth by birth, surname, or skin. I will not spread lies that incite hatred. I will treat all faiths with respect, even if I do not follow them. I will support policies that expand opportunity for the least advantaged. I will try to be, first of all, a good human being and a good citizen—part of one Indian family.
If such a pledge were affirmed in schools, colleges, workplaces, and local gatherings, it would gradually erode the subconscious prejudices we all carry.

13. Conclusion: From Blame to Co-Ownership
India’s story is too large, too deep, and too complex to be captured by any single narrative—whether of perfect golden ages or of unbroken oppression. We are the heirs of both extraordinary spiritual and intellectual achievements and of systems of hierarchy that violated those very achievements.
The central claim of this paper is:
* We are one composite people, forged by migrations and mixtures of Dravidian, Indo-Aryan, and many other streams.
* The worst damage to India’s moral and political health was done when funtion based varna ideals were corrupted into rigid, birth-based caste hierarchies.
* Responsibility for this damage lies not with any single living community but with historical structures that some elites failed to resist and sometimes exploited.
* The way forward lies in truth-telling without hatred, remedies without revenge, and unity without uniformity.
If we consciously adopt the ethic of Confess, Pardon, Reconcile and if we commit ourselves to reimagining India as a fellowship of equal citizens, then the phrase “We the People of India” will cease to be a mere constitutional opening and will become a lived reality.
This “we the people “ series will be published touching other concerned topics

14. Endnotes (Indicative and Expandable)
1. For accessible overviews of genetic and archaeological work on South Asian population history, see e.g. David Reich, Who We Are and How We Got Here (Oxford University Press, 2018); Tony Joseph, Early Indians: The Story of Our Ancestors and Where We Came From (Juggernaut, 2018).
2. On “Dravidian” and “Aryan” as linguistic–cultural, not rigid racial categories, see Asko Parpola, The Roots of Hinduism: The Early Aryans and the Indus Civilization (Oxford University Press, 2015); Bhadriraju Krishnamurti, The Dravidian Languages (Cambridge University Press, 2003).
3. For debates on the relative chronology of Sanskrit and Tamil, see George L. Hart, The Poems of Ancient Tamil(University of California Press, 1975); Sheldon Pollock, The Language of the Gods in the World of Men(University of California Press, 2006).
4. On scripts and literacy in early India, see Richard Salomon, Indian Epigraphy (Oxford University Press, 1998).
5. For a social history of caste, see Nicholas B. Dirks, Castes of Mind: Colonialism and the Making of Modern India (Princeton University Press, 2001); Susan Bayly, Caste, Society and Politics in India from the Eighteenth Century to the Modern Age (Cambridge University Press, 1999).
6. B.R. Ambedkar’s Annihilation of Caste (1936) remains a foundational critique of caste as a religiously sanctioned hierarchy; see also his Revolution and Counter-Revolution in Ancient India (posthumous).
7. For the Mauryan period, see Romila Thapar, Aśoka and the Decline of the Mauryas (Oxford University Press, 1961); Upinder Singh, A History of Ancient and Early Medieval India (Pearson, 2008).
8. On karmic justification and caste, see Gavin Flood, An Introduction to Hinduism (Cambridge University Press, 1996), chapters on dharma and varna; and contemporary Dalit theologians’ responses in collections such as Arvind P. Nirmal (ed.), A Reader in Dalit Theology.