UNTOUCHABLES IN CONTEMPORARY INDIA

Untouchables have, for many centuries, occupied a very low place in Indian society, Even today, they are among the most subordinated and poorest people in the country. But, despite many efforts to ameliorate their condition, a considerable edifice of discrimination persists. So far, scholarly accounts of untouchability have been few in number and limited to one aspect of the subject, or to observations in a single village or region. The present account offers a greater variety of academic perspectives and a broader range of observations on the subject than any previous publication. Written with the needs of historians of South Asia to students of politics, economics, religion and sociology, it will have an interdisciplinary appeal too.