The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c7.s16.t3.1

c7.s16.t3.1

And here we encounter a new form of race-contacts in political evolution. These consisted in blood-fusion between the diverse tribes, races or nations within the boundaries of India herself. These contacts were engendered as much by migrations as by military marches, conquests and settlements, and by economic necessity. The alleged inferior, despicable, “fallen”, depressed and similar orders of the Indian population found in these stirs and turmoils the chances for self-assertion. Another class of people likewise got opportunities of elevation in this kind of dynamic unrest. These were all those groups or communities which somehow or other did not happen to belong to but rested outside the groups representing the culture, wealth or political influence of the region. A very common name for both these classes,—the “fallen” and the “outsiders”—was *Vrātya* in certain periods.⁵¹