The incident follows escalated tensions over the suicide of a low-caste academic after he was suspended from Hyderabad University, adding to claims of religious and cultural intolerance under Prime Minister Modi.
Ms Hnatkovska's findings remain controversial, but most Indian academics agree that caste rigidities are loosening, mainly thanks to the growth of non-agricultural employment and improved access to basic education.There is still a long way to go.
Neuroscientist Ratnesh Lal, an associate research biologist on soft money at the UC Santa Barbara Neuroscience Research Institute, compares the academic culture to the caste system in his native India, with soft-money researchers trapped at the bottom.
Contrary to the wide academic and media conflation of caste and Hinduism, the practice of caste-based discrimination is in direct contradiction to the quintessential Hindu teaching that each individual is equally divine and has the potential to realize God based on his or her own effort.
Mr. Daniel, former director of Columbia's South Asian Institute, told of the resistance he faced among upper-caste Indians on an academic committee when he wanted to name an endowed chair in Indian political economics after a noted untouchable, Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, a Columbia graduate who helped draft the Indian Constitution, which abolished the caste system decades ago.
Mr. Daniel, former director of Columbia's South Asian Institute, told of the resistance he faced among upper-caste Indians on an academic committee when he wanted to name an endowed chair in Indian political economics after a noted untouchable, Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, a Columbia graduate who helped draft the Indian Constitution, which decades ago abolished the caste system.
Although Gandhi is held in high regard for his crucial role in leading the peaceful struggle to win independence, some of his beliefs and actions have been questioned by academics and historians, in particular his views on caste.
The debate over caste in the New India is more than academic.
But this longstanding system for tracking children by academic ability for more effective teaching evolved into an uncomfortable caste system in which students were largely segregated by race and socioeconomic background, both inside and outside classrooms.
Academic studies suggest that the quotas have not benefited upper castes at the expense of more impoverished groups.
