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Sociology Optional PYQ Solutions · Model answer

Write short note: Ritual purity and pollution in Hindu Society

  • UPSC 1991
  • Caste System

Ritual purity (shuddhi) and pollution (ashuddhi) form the idiom in which Hindu society has traditionally expressed rank, distance and obligation. Louis Dumont made the opposition the generative principle of caste in Homo Hierarchicus (1966), but as an institution it is wider than caste ranking alone.

You are reading the opening of the model answer. The full answer is part of Sociology Optional PYQ Solutions.

What the full answer covers

  • Two kinds of pollution
  • How the idiom organises social life
  • Persistence and critique
  • Conclusion

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