This glass floor-protecting affluent children from falling is also a glass ceiling, blocking upward mobility for those born on a lower rung of the ladder. 
 

America’s resource hoarding and gentrification are largely facilitated by white populations towards PoC communities. However, in India, resource hoarding is a phenomenon prevalent amongst the upper-castes from the marginalised communities. Upper caste communities in India hoard resources by vocalising their support for privatisation and abolition of reservation in education and employment (Sharma, 2012). 

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While many of them claim vocal support for “merit” and claim their children’s success stems entirely from the brilliance and hard work, data reveals that their wealth and facilities have grown significantly throughout generations and continue to do so while invading and erasing spaces belonging to the lower-castes.

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Income inequality within Castes in India: 

 

A two-year-long study titled Wealth Ownership and Inequality in India: A socio-religious analysis (2015-2017), jointly undertaken by the Savitribai Phule Pune University (SPPU), Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) and Indian Institute of Dalit Studies (IIDS) revealed that 22.3% of the country’s higher caste Hindus own 41% of the country’s total wealth. Similarly, according to a paper by the World Equality Database titled ‘Wealth Inequality, Class and Caste in India, 1961-2012’ (2018), India’s upper caste households earned 47% more than the national average annual household income. The top 10% within these castes own almost 60% of the wealth (Bharti, 2018). 

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The data here reveals how the mobilization of wealth facilitates suppression of the lower-caste communities. “Highly educated Americans are not just more likely to be married: they are more likely to be married to each other” (Reeves, 2017). 

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Similarly, class, caste and colour usually play an important role in the creation of all social relations; especially those of kinship. Hushed matrimonial advertisements in newspapers signify just how rampant discrimination, detrimental anti-conversion laws such as Love Jihad and the criminalization of inter-caste marriages in India leads to isolation of wealth within the upper-caste population. 

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Caste and the myth of the self-made in India: 

 

‘Geeli Pucchi’ is a story of two people; Bharti and Priya. A short film directed by Neeraj Ghyawan. Bharti is a machine operator at a factory who is joined by Priya, a gentle, gullible beginner on campus. It is established that Bharti’s Dalit identity plays the consequential roadblock in achieving her desired desk job as a data operator. On the other hand, Priya, who is upper caste, exerts and enjoys her privileges with complete naivety. In their first meeting when Priya asked Bharti’s surname, she said Bharti Banarjee instead of Mandol. The few seconds of pause before Bharti’s response succeeds in capturing the colossal burden of anxiety of consequences, rejection, judgment, that marginalised people constantly battle with. The film, Geeli Pucchi, highlights how challenging it is for Bharti Mandol to move up the social ladder. While Priya is hailed as a ‘working-class woman’, her job is a consequence of her Brahmin surname.

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Taking India as its focus, it finds that caste has been treated as an obsolescent system and source of historical disadvantage due to compensation through affirmative action. Caste effects are not local; they travel from the villages to the cities and effectively infiltrate all markets (Marar, 2019). Caste perseveres in the age of the market because of its convenience to the upper caste – its mobilization sanctions discrimination; which in turn allows for opportunity and resource hoarding by the caste elite. Another reason for this rampant and covert socially normalized behaviour is the insecurity and the threat of the progress of marginalised communities, instigating humiliation and violence against them. The evidence highlights the need for policy upheaval to address market and non-market discrimination and to remove hurdles, especially in the informal and private sector; and ensure that caste has its genuine place in the global development policy debate (Paliath, 2019). 

 

Where caste becomes prominent is in highly-coordinated and sometimes fatal violence, often directed at Dalits whose success, self-respect infringements of caste and kinship conventions, romantic choices or access to public office so threatens the relational standing of upper-caste communities.

 

For many Dalits, the city represents escape from rural labour and the looming risk of humiliation. However, urban areas also have their own “self-made” myths (Sharma, 2012). The commercial and widely popular phrase “rags to riches” describes social mobility in an analogy to geographical mobility (Paul, 2014). 

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In a 2016 article titled ‘Breaking the Myth of Self-Made’, Bob McKinnon posits, “The net definition of success isn’t extreme wealth, but a middle-class place in society and a good reputation” (McKinnon, 2016). In its hegemonic version, the myth of the self-made man refers to expressive individualism and individual success (Menon, 2005). Most lower-caste communities move to urban India to facilitate their growth and free themselves from the shackles of caste. 

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However, caste in urban India exists from matrimonial columns to silenced whispers. Residential segregation is vigorously alive and flourishing in the country.  According to a census ‘Provisional Population Totals Urban Agglomerations and Cities’ published in 2011, more than a third of SC/STs living in Delhi are closely huddled in 42 high-concentration wards in a city with a total of 234 wards. The lack of access to basic amenities may be comparatively because of poverty but there is abundant evidence around the globe to suggest that residential segregation itself is a consequence of poverty, impairing chances of education and employment for marginalized groups (Gupta, 2005).  

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While Dalits and lower-caste communities continue to face injustices, upper-caste India continues enjoying their growing wealth. Upper-caste Hindus ensure they grow up in nice, polished zip codes, wealthy localities, provide social connections that make an impact when entering the labour force, help with internships, aid nepotism and with tuition and home-buying. Residential segregation, however, less spoken about, is rampant across India. While private schools and colleges ensure prominent opportunities for the children of upper-castes. Marriages within the caste hierarchy ensure that wealth stays within the upper-castes and doesn’t dribble down to the others. 

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There is a popular saying in India’s politics, ‘Jaati Nahi Jaati’, which means that every decision, every policy has an underlying wave of caste in India. Annihilation of Caste is the only policy that can bring about change. Dalit aspirations continue to disturb the upper-caste. 

 

As B. R. Ambedkar said in his book ‘Annihilation of Caste’― “Dalit aspirations are a breach of peace. Annihilation of Caste is a breach of peace.”