Page:The history of caste in India.pdf/142

 cause he is more pure and sacred than other castes, while Mahar and Paraiyan are at the bottom because they are impure. This purity is the pivot on which the entire system turns. Rank, social position, economic condition have no direct effect on the gradation from the standpoint of caste. They are simply aids to establish the status. Caste in India is strong and rigid because the ideas of the people regarding purity and pollution are rigid.

We find in our text that various articles, hours, conditions, and places, almost everything that can be imagined, were graded according to their supposed purity and impurity. The status of a caste or a tribe always depended on the karma, which in various degrees might be pure or impure. The wide range and the minute gradation of substances and actions with regard to purity and