Brahmins as scientists and science as Brahmins’ calling: Caste in an Indian scientific research institute

Abstract

The domination of Brahmin and the upper caste scientists have given a Brahmanical identity to science in India. They have been perceived to be the natural inheritors of scientific practice, an assertion reaffirmed by scientists and researchers during my fieldwork in Bangalore, India. Furthermore, merit and passion for doing science was reinscribed and calibrated to denote the alleged castelessness and objectivity of science, obfuscating the deep hierarchies of caste in the practice of science in India. By using ethnographic methods, the article attempts to demonstrate how Indian scientists constructed their identities as casteless beings. The article calls for a public understanding of caste in Indian science, and suggests that public engagement has the potential to democratise the nature of science by addressing the question of exclusion and discrimination in Indian scientific institutions and universities.