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The caste living in a village or a group of neighbouring villages, are bound together by economic ties. Generally peasant castes are numerically predominant in villages and they need carpenter, blacksmith, barber, water-man, watch-man, washer-man and leather worker castes to perform agricultural work. Servicing castes such as priest (Brahmin as well as non- Brahmin), barber, washerman, and water carrier cater to the needs of everyone except Harijans. Artisan castes produce goods which are wanted by everyone. Most Indian villages do not have more than a few of the essential castes and depend on neighbouring villages for certain services, skills, and goods.
In rural India, with its largely subsistent economy, the relationship between the different caste groups in a village takes a particular form. The essential artisan and servicing castes are paid annually in grain at harvest. In some parts of India, the artisan and servicing castes are also provided with free food, clothing, fodder, and residential site. On such occasions as birth, marriage, and death, these castes perform extra duties for which they are paid a customary sum of money and some gifts in kind. This type of relationship is found all over India and is calleri by different names: Jajmani in the North, Mirasi in Madras, Bara Balule in Maharashtra, and Ad a de in Mysore. The relationship between the Jajman and his Karnin is unequal, since the latter is regarded as inferior. The right to serve is hereditary, transferable, saleable, mortgageable, and partible.
The Jajmani system bound together the different castes living in a village or a group of neighbouring villages. The caste-wise division of labour and the consequent Unking up of different castes in enduring and pervasive relationships provided a pattern of alliances which cut across the ties of caste. The modern ‘caste problem’ is to some extent the result of the weakening, in the last sixty years or more, of these vertical and local ties and consequent strengthening of horizontal ties over whole area.
The relationship between landowner and tenant, master and servant, creditor and debtor, may all be subsumed under a single category—patron and client. This relationship is widespread and crucial to the understanding of rural India. Voting at elections, local and general, is influenced by the patron-client tie.
Ritual occasions like life-cycle ceremonies, festivals and fairs, require the co-operation of several castes. Certain rituals which are common for all the castes occur at birth, girls puberty, marriage, and death.Several castes are also required to cooperate in the performance of calender, festivals, and festivals of village deities.
The functioning of the village as a political and social entity brought together members from different castes. Every village had a headman usually belonging to the dominant caste. The accountant was always Brahmin in South India. Every village had a watchman and messengers. In the irrigated areas, there was always a man to look after and regulate the flow of water in the canals feeding the fields. The headman and accountant collected the land taxes with the aid of llarijan village servants.
The village council performed a variety of tasks, including the maintenance of law and order, settling of disputes, celebrations of festivals and construction of roads, bridges, and tanks.
of race is visible. In the opinion of Prof. Aijazuddin Ahmad, “Those who managed to drift into the isolated and remote parts of the subcontinent could preserve their original ethnic traits which remained by and large unaffected by the fresh waves of incursions witnessed along the main corridor of movement connecting the Kabul Valley with the North Indian Plain”. The Indian population has been classified by a number of scholars. Some of the important classifications are as follows: