I have a consuming interest in castes without having the slightest bit of prejudice for or against any of them.

Whenever I ‘am in a conference seminar or a social function I count how many of the most important belong to what castes. It has never been more than a matter of curiosity. But one conclusion is inevitable: Whatever is the sphere of curiosity-literary scientific and bureaucratic or whatever-the Brahmin remains the top dog. It may be ethnic or it may be the result of several generations of learning of which they held the monopoly till the last century or both combined. Before I give details we should bear in mind that Brahmins form no more than 3.5% of the population of our country.

My statistics come from a pen friend Brother Stanny of St. Anne’s Church of Dhule in Maharashtra. He has compiled figures of different castes in government employment during British rule in 1935 and as they were 35 years after Independence in 1982. During British rule the largest proportion of government jobs (40%) were held by Kayasthas Today their figure has dropped to 7%. Next came the Muslims who were given special privileges by the British. They had 35% jobs in 1953 in free India their representation has dropped to 3.5%. Christians likewise favored by the English had 15% their figure has dropped to 1% Scheduled Castes tribes and backward classes who had hardly any government jobs have achieved a representation of 9%. But the most striking contrast is in the employment of Brahmins Under the British they had 3% fractionally less than the proportion of their population today they hold as much as 70% of government jobs-1 presume the figure refers only to gazette posts. In the senior echelons of the civil service from the rank of deputy secretaries upwards out of 500 there are 310 Brahmins ie 63% of the 26 state chief secretaries 19 are Brahmins of the 27 Governors and Lt. Governors 13 are Brahmins of the 16 Supreme Court judges 9 are Brahmins of the 330 judges of the High Court’s 166 are Brahmins of 140 ambassadors 58 are Brahmins of 98 vice-chancellors 50 are Brahmins of 438 district magistrates 250 are Brahmins of the total of 3300 IAS officers 2376 are Brahmins. They do equally well in electoral posts of the 530 Lok Sabha members 190 are Brahmins of 244 in the Rajya Sabha 89 are Brahmins. These statistics clearly prove that this 3.5% of Brahmin community of India holds “between” 36% to 63% of all the plum jobs available in the country. How this has come about I do not know. But I can scarcely believe that it is entirely due to the Brahmin’s higher IQ.

(Khushwant Singh)

Article extracted from this publication >> February 22, 1991