Dr. B. R. Ambedkar on Economic Analysis of the Caste

There are number of institutions in the economy of any country. Taking into consideration their duties and responsibilities being performed by them, they are classified into economic institutions, political institutions, religious institutions, social institutions, legal institutions, cultural institutions, and so and so forth. In traditional ideology of the thought, caste is a social institution. It has been originated to perform social duties and responsibilities, and it has a strong religious base. Thus caste as a social institution discharges both the social as well as religious functions. Nobody has looked at caste system as an economic institution. Even nobody thought of caste system can be an economic institution, which provides the framework of an economic system and performs the number of economic functions. It can perform the economic functions of the economic institutions like production, distribution, consumption, allocation and utilization of the productive resources and distribution of the goods and services among the people in the society as a whole. It is the Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, a unique personality in the world, who had an innovative approach looking towards the caste system, that caste is not only a social institution, but prominently it is an economic institution. Hence it performs the number of economic functions, and it is therefore an economic organisation. It is therefore Dr. Ambedkar started with studying the origin, mechanism and development of castes in India to the annihilation of the caste system in his very commendable research work for the seminar and conference presidential address. He is of the opinion that caste system in India is an economic institution, and more importantly it performs the number of economic functions in the society, which are dominantly economically exploitative to the depressed and backward communities like dalits in India. He has examined how caste system is an economic institution, the economic functions it performs, its exploitation of the backward and deprived communities in India, and more importantly how the annihilation of the caste system is possible. It is against this over all background, the present paper endeavours to examine the economic analysis of the caste system provided by Dr. B. R. Ambedkar in his book 'Annihilation of Caste', and also explores its present relevance in India . The present study concludes that there is applicability of the economic analysis of the caste in India even in the present context also.