Indin Social System Ram Ahuja (sociology)

PREFACE

After forty-six years of independence, we cannot expect Indian society to remain static and completely traditional. While looking back and ahead, we feel that we might have not succeeded in building a Welfare State in India of which every individual may be proud of, but we have surely laid the foundation of a healthy society. The society is healthy be-cause on the one hand we have preserved several traditional institutions and values, and on the other have imbibed those modern norms and practices which we consider functional in achieving our collective goals of social, economic, political and cultural development.

There are many books on Indian society. The present one resembles most of them in some ways, yet it differs some of them in many ways. Besides, the book is distinctive in several ways. Serious attention has been paid not only to themes like social change and modernization but also to the ways in which the subsystems like marriage, family and caste adapt to altered circumstances while retaining enough integrity for sur-vival

Several models have been utilized in the analysis. The social scien-tific model has been used to guide the collection of data on subsystems; the evolutionary model to interpret changes in the subsystems throughout history; the structural model to assess the interrelationship among various constituents of the subsystems; and the functional model to analyze the interrelations among various subsystems. The analysis of subsystems has also been based on empirical studies. Jargons have been avoided and the writing has been simplified. We have resisted the temptation of developing any theory because to succumb to it would have left our writings looking like the vague musings of social philosophers. If we have succeeded in our effort of presenting our views in a lucid style, the book will provide to students of society a good sociological perspective for understanding the Indian social system.

The writing of a book can be creative if it takes into consideration the approaches of other scholars too. Our dependence on other writers is varied in form, limitless in range, and often deep in feeling. We may not

list and acknowledge the contribution of all of them to this book, but we express out gratitude to them for providing us a base for our writings and our apologies for any distortions that may have crept in.

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