Varna and the decadent Indian society ***

Recently, a friend had quoted Swami Dayanand Saraswati, who in a lecture series had said that Indians are not used to competition. They were used to hereditary occupations, which automatically excludes competition to get a job. Hence when faced with today's overpowering reality, they tend to panic and need to fix odds by bribery or such unfair means.

Did the Varna system which gave rise to the hereditary occupational grouping lead to this chaotic society where bribery and corruption is an accepted part of life in Indian society?

The ancient Varna and caste systems categorize Hindu society into four "varnas" or social classes and prescribe specific duties for each. These are the brahmins (priests and teachers), kshatriyas (taking care of administration, battle, and law enforcement), vaisyas (customarily in agriculture, commerce, and cow-protection), and shudras (who provide service to members of the other three varnas). Brahmins enjoyed the highest social stature, the khastriyas command the highest political power while the vaishyas enjoy highest economic prosperity.

The system of four varnas was said to have been created by Sri Krishna as stated in the Bhagavad-Gita 4.13:

catur-varnyaam mayaa srstam guna-karma-vibhaagasaha
tasya kartaaram api maam viddhy akartaaram avyayam

"The four orders of society were created by Me classifying them according to the mode of Prakriti predominant in each and apportioning corresponding duties to them; though the author of this creation, know Me, the immortal Lord, to be a non-doer."

And the Purusha Suktam says:

braamhaNoO asya mukham-aasiit

baahuu raajanyaH kRitaHa

uuruu tadAsya yad-vaishyaHa

padbhyaa(gm) shuudro ajaayata

"The Brahmana was the mouth of the purusha, his two arms were made into the Rajanya, his two thighs were the Vaishya, and from his two feet the Shudra was born."

So what went wrong ?

While Hindus generally followed their prescribed duties for the greater good of the entire society, there apparently was fluidity of castes or occupation groups. The system seemes to have been accepted as natural, existing to maintain an harmonious and functional society based on spiritual ideals. The family / community based occupational groups were self sustaining, and the system propagated itself within this fluid arrangement.

The varnas were also organized according to progressively greater predominance of desirable qualities or gunas (sattva, rajas and tamas). Brahmins were required to cultivate predominantly sattvic attributes and have minimal rajasic or tamasic qualities. Kshatriyas were required to have greater rajasic qualities albeit tempered by some sattvic qualities, vaishyas would have more tamasic and rajasic qualities but still sattvic qualities, while shudras were allowed to have predominantly tamasic and rajasic qualities. Looks like this is where the problem lies. Failure to cultivate the appropriate gunas.