Justice R.M. Sahai [1]
572. Can the word ‘class’ be understood as caste ? What does the word ‘class’ mean ? According to dictionary it means ‘division of society according to status, rank, caste, merit, grace or quality’. Burtoon defines it, as ‘category, classification, breed, caste, group, order, rank’. In Webster it, is defined as, member or body of persons with common characteristics, social rank or caste, Whereas Oxford defines caste as, ‘race, leinage, pure stock or breed’. English historians have defined caste as, ‘hereditary classes into which Hindu society is divided’. Sociologists describe it as, ‘ascribed status’. Class is thus wider and may mean caste. Is it so for Article 16 ? In Hindi version of the Constitution the word is ‘varg’ that is group and not ‘jati’ that is caste or community. The word class cannot and was not used as caste as it was constitutionally considered to be destructive of secularism. In our country caste system is peculiar to Hindus. It is unknown to Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists and Jains. The Constitution was framed not for Hindus only. Provision was made for a society hetregenous in character but secular in outlook. ‘It was a compromistic formula’, a positive effort to equalise one and all. Even among Hindus where caste system is an, ‘institution most highly developed’ the society is divided into large number of separate groups mostly functional or tribal in origin. By 20th Century the, ‘lowest classes of Hindu society’, came to be identified as depressed class’ or ‘untouchable – a name of comparatively recent origin’. Rigidity developed over years was partly due to Hindu orthodoxy and partly due to British exploitation. Whatever reason but scheduled castes and scheduled tribes were undoubtedly, ‘truly’, ‘relatively’ or ‘really backward’. When the Constitution was framed the framers were aware of preferential treatment on religion, race and caste. In Southern States communal reservation in services was in vogue. Yet Dr. Ambedkar while defending the use of word ‘backward’ by drafting committee explained that, ‘it was to enable other communities to share the services which for historical reasons, has been controlled by one community or a few community’. The word, ‘community’ has been defined in Webster Comprehensive Dictionary as, ‘The people who reside in one locality and are subject to the same laws, have the same interests, the public or society at large’, and according to Oxford it means ‘the quality of appertaining to all in common, common ownership, common character’. Class was thus used in a wider sense and not in the restricted sense of caste.
[1] This article is an excerpt from the judgment of Indira Sawhney v Union of India 1993 (1) SCT 448