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Changing Indian Society The book has been divided into 10 chapters. Whereas the ‘Population Profile’ discusses the census data on different population aspects such as growth rates, birth rates, death rates, sex ratios, aging, and population distribution (by residence, religion, and literacy), the ‘Urban India’ describes the growth of urbanisation, typology of urban areas, size, performed functions (religious cities, capital cities, trade centres, industrial townships, ancient cities, etc.), and emerging social structures within the cities (including indigenous city (or old cities), civil lines (sadar), cantonment areas (chhavani), special areas, slums or bastis, and village enclaves). Similarly, the chapter on ‘Village India’ describes villages in ancient and modern India. The share of tribal population is 8 per cent of India’s population. The book discusses the racial and linguistic distribution of tribal in India, levels of economy, social organizations, degrees of cultural contacts, and development planning for them in India. One interesting aspect of the book is inclusion of a chapter on ‘Varna and Jati’ The author has described different aspects related to the caste system and has rightly distinguished between caste, religion, gotra, jati, varna and sub-castes. He argues that from ancient time the key character of caste is endogamy (in-marrying or allowing its members to marry within the group) though in contemporary India, there are rising instances of inter-caste marriages. The chapter on “Marriage, Family and Kinship” discusses mainly the theoretical aspects related to formation of families and kinship. It discusses how families in India based on the patriarchal or matriarchal models determine the rules regarding the lineage and descent, residence, inheritance and incest. Further, the type of family is identified by way of type of marriages (monogamous or polygamy), couple’s residence place (patrilocal (reside with husband’s family), matrilocal (resides with mother’s family), neolocal (stays at a new place), virilocal (husband’s house, uxorilocal (wife’s house), size and composition of the family (nuclear, compound, broken or incomplete, stem, linear and extended or joint family), authority structure and descent and inheritance. The chapter also briefly describes the family system among the Khasis, Garos and Nayars as examples of matrilocal and matrilineal societies. Related to this authority system is the next chapter on the status of women. Besides a short discussion on some demographic indicators such as sex ratio, literacy and education, employment, the chapter discusses the formation of social legislation to improve the status of women in India. The book also discusses ‘Indian polity’ highlighting political climate in India particularly after the independence with focus on socio-economic reforms, changing party structure, emergence of coalition politics, changes in voter’s profile and role of judiciary. In conclusion, the book mentions that Indian social life is changing on all fronts. In future, the main challenge of India would be to manage multiplicity arising with more urbanization and society becoming pluricultural and multi-religious. Theoretical aspects and empirical data are well presented in the book, which would be particularly useful for under-graduate students. I personally enjoyed reading the book and wished the author had included some more empirical insights to explore the dynamic India.
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India is a multicultural entity comprising different ethnic origins, religions, and dialects yet bonded together as a nation, sharing a common polity and economy. The book begins with a brief profile of India via its topography, history, racial origins, linguistic diversity, and plurality of religion. It shows how the emerging culture of India has mixed several elements from different sub-cultures and even cultural traits from abroad without disturbing the distinctive Indian characteristics.