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Everybody who got a little knowledge about India knows that Indian culture–or Hindu culture if you like– are based on casteism as the main principle. Socio-religious life divided into five major castes: brahmin, kshatrya, et.al. Each caste has its own job suited for it. for example, brahmin the highest caste is suited for the position of priest; kshatrya for running and defending the country (the aristocrat), and the job of the other three relating to do with day-to-day social-life within the society. e.g. shiva the carpenter, etc.
the indian muslim-on one way or the other-also embrace this kinda caste system, despite in contradiction with the principle of islam wich promote equality for all. the rank of muslim caste can be traced through their surename. Caste-wise top-down as follows: sayyid, khan, qureshi, anshari, etc. anshari is the lowest rank in muslim india casteism. but casteism in muslim india are not so overwhelming as in the hindu.
as far as hindu caste goes, somebody who not included in the five major castes is called the OUTCASTE. this’s the lowest of the low in hindu society. religiously speaking, they cannot touch the holy book of hinduism because they’re unclean. therefore, they’re also forbidden to be touched by anyone from the five major castes. it’s this outcaste group who sometime enter en-masse into islam or christianity which often enrages the hindu priest and resulted in phisical conflict between hindus and the minority (muslim and christian).
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since the caste mentality among the indian hindu society so overwhelming, it’s not entirely surprising if they regard themselves so highly, specially among the highest ranks. as a result, they regard any foreigners as OUTCASTE, it means foreigners are much lower than them from social-status point of view! this mindset particularly prevalent to foreigners who have a mongoloit phisical appearance like chinese, japanese, including indonesian like me.
the racism is so inherent to hindu and indian society, buat sometimes they change their attitude after going abroad and see the real world is much better than their own in india!