Justify that the Indian traditions are modernizing. Also discuss its contributing factors. (2025)
“Modernization implies a rational attitude towards issues and their evaluation from a universal view point.” — Yogendra Singh. On that test, modernisation is not Westernisation, and Indian tradition is not being displaced by modernity; it is itself modernising. Singh’s formulation in Modernization of Indian Tradition (1973) is exact: the form of a traditional institution may stay intact while its substance is transformed to incorporate modernity.
The justification: tradition performing modern functions
- Caste has become organisationally modern. The jati now works through registered associations, scholarship trusts, cooperative banks and electoral bargaining. The unit is old; the repertoire — accounts, elections, litigation, publicity — is modern.
- Religion has acquired rational-bureaucratic organisation. Temple endowments operate as statutory boards with audited accounts. At the Maha Kumbh of 2025 the state managed a gathering officially reported at over 66 crore visits with some 2,750 artificial-intelligence-enabled cameras and predictive crowd-density modelling — the oldest ritual calendar run by the newest technique.
- Knowledge systems have entered regulated markets. Ayurveda and yoga are now licensed, standardised and exported: AYUSH exports stood at about Rs 5,907 crore in 2024–25, and the sector is projected to expand several-fold by 2030.
- The family has been rationalised from within. In Vineeta Sharma v Rakesh Sharma (2020) the Supreme Court held that daughters are coparceners by birth in Mitakshara joint-family property — a traditional institution reconstituted on a universalistic principle rather than abolished.
- Cultural change is directional. M. N. Srinivas saw Sanskritisation giving way to open assertion of caste identity for secular gains: legitimacy is now claimed from rights and citizenship, not ritual rank.
Contributing factors
- Structural sources (largely heterogenetic): colonial law, bureaucracy, land settlement and English education, followed by planned development, adult franchise, panchayati raj and a reforming Constitution.
- Cultural sources (largely orthogenetic): reform movements arguing from within the tradition — the Brahmo Samaj (1828), the Arya Samaj (1875) — and Mahatma Gandhi‘s mobilisation, which Singh reads as tradition’s own response to Westernisation.
- Economic pressure: urbanisation, market exchange, migration and occupational mobility, which loosen ascriptive ties without announcing a new doctrine.
- Communication: India’s internet subscriber base crossed 1,002 million by June 2025, carrying devotional, caste and reformist messages alike into the same handset.
- Legal-constitutional compulsion: the abolition of untouchability, reservation and successive personal-law reforms give modern values coercive force.
Conclusion
Indian tradition modernises because modernisation in India has run through traditional institutions rather than around them, which is why S. N. Eisenstadt‘s multiple modernities describes the outcome better than any convergence theory. The justified claim is therefore a careful one: tradition is being reconstituted, not dissolved, and its persistence is evidence of adaptive capacity rather than of resistance.