Caste – Brown Pundits

Interdiction

October 13, 2025October 13, 2025X.T.MAncient India, Brown Pundits, Caste, Civilisation, India, Pakistan, X.T.MBP commentariat, Brown Pundits, civil debate, Comment Policy, Dharma, digital etiquette, free speech, Hindu Muslim dialogue, interdiction, Israel-Palestine, izzat, Kabir, moderation, online community standards, online discourse, Pakistani culture, platform integrity, respect, South Asia, Substack20 Comments

I’ve made a decision: Kabir will no longer be allowed to comment on Brown Pundits.

This isn’t about silencing the only active Pakistani Muslim voice here. Nor is it about shutting down disagreement. It’s about something more basic: respect; for this space, for conversation, and for the people who show up in good faith.

Earlier today, I had to invoke the five-comment deletion rule after one of Sbarrkum’s replies crossed a line. He implied grotesque accusations. I’ve said it before: all life is sacred. That kind of slander won’t stand. Ever.

The admins have asked me for some time to be firmer. I’ve held back. I value openness. But Brown Pundits is not a free-for-all. We care about how people argue, not just what they argue.

I’d meant to write something calmer after yoga. Because I care about this project. I believe in it. BP must be a place of respect. That comes from a deeper idea; dharma, a commitment to plurality and balance. Even when we fall short, that’s the standard we aim for.

I’m not saying India, or the BP commentariat, always gets it right. Sometimes, on topics like caste, we speak from a place of blind privilege. And as the founder, I know my voice carries weight. That’s not always fair.

But this is the key: we must disagree with grace. And Kabir doesn’t. His tone is often scornful. He treats this space as beneath him.

Over the years, I’ve seen something: for many Pakistanis, the deepest value is ‘Izzat; honour and status. It often matters more than truth. But that ‘Izzat seems to vanish in the face of power—especially when that power is Western or Arab. Kabir speaks glowingly of “the West.” But when it comes to Dharma Asia, he sneers.

That sneer has been aimed at Brown Pundits. And I won’t allow that anymore. Kabir may see BP as “lesser,” unworthy of his respect. You don’t get to sneer and stay.

This isn’t a permanent ban. But it is an interdiction. Kabir is welcome to focus on his Substack. I wish him well. If he ever wants to return, he can contact me directly. But that will require real contrition; not performance.

Let me end with this: this is not about politics. People here hold strong views; on India, on Palestine, on religion. That’s not the problem. The problem is contempt. Mockery. Scorn. Brown Pundits will always welcome hard conversations. But only if they’re honest. And only if they’re respectful.

On another happier note, Nigerian ingenuity:

Pakistan’s Inner Logic

October 11, 2025October 11, 2025X.T.MBrown Pundits, Caste, Civilisation, Colonialism, Economics, Gender, India, Indian Subcontinent, Pakistan, Partition, Postcolonialism & the Global South, X.T.MAitchison College, Baloch identity, Bangladesh, caste, Christians in Pakistan, class structure, elite schooling, Ethnicity, feudalism, Hinduphobia, identity politics, Imran Khan, invented nations, Islam, Israel comparison, Kabir, language politics, Modernity, Nationalism, Pakistan, Pakistan history, Pakistani modernisation, Pakistani psyche, post-1971 Pakistan, Postcolonial State, regional languages, Religion, rural Pakistan, Sindhi nationalism, Social Media, South Asia, TNT ideology, Urdu speakers24 Comments

On Nivedita & Archer’s joint request (Mamnoon/Tashakor/Merci for the kind words); I’m going to expand on my comment:

“Kabir is definitely right. Ethnicity in Pakistan is complex; there are three tiers of society. The English speaking elite (Imran is part of that so is Kabir), who are “Pakistanis” and ethnicity isn’t really reflected on…”

This comment, which the BP archives have tons of similar posts on (BP was venerable even in 2014), sketches the bones of Pakistan’s sociological map. But what lies beneath the skin?

Pakistan is feudal; India is not.

That one statement alone explains much. Landholding elites dominate politics, rural economies still function on patronage, and class mobility is rare. Caste, though “denied,” is real and sharper, in some ways, than it could ever be in India (the reservation system does not really exist in Pakistan except for religious minorities but not for socio-economic castes). Pakistanis can sniff out class in one another with a dexterity that’s probably only matched in the United Kingdom, which is the home of class stratification (I remember reading Dorian Gray in Karachi in the early millennium and shocked how similar late Victorian early Edwardian England was).

The postcolonial state froze itself in amber. There has never been a serious leftist rupture, excepting 1971’s successful Bengali revolution. Even Imran Khan, who styled himself a reformist, is a product of elite schools, Aitchison College, Oxford, and aristocratic lineage. His “Islamic socialism” was only ever viable because Pakistanis still believe in myths of the benevolent landlord.

And yet, Pakistanis sometimes seem happier than their Indian counterparts, even if not remotely successful. Why? Continue reading Pakistan’s Inner Logic

Caste in America

October 9, 2025October 10, 2025X.T.MBrown Pundits, Caste, Civilisation, Culture, Diaspora, Hinduism, History, India, Indian Subcontinent, Mughals, Music, Partition, Postcolonialism & the Global South, Politics, Society, X.T.MAmir Khusrao, Bharat Mata, Bhatkhande, Biryani, Brahmin culture, Brahminism, Brown Pundits, civilizational debate, cultural erasure, Dalit rights, Hindu genocide, Hindu-Muslim synthesis, Hinduism, Hindustani Classical Music, identity politics, India activism, Indian diaspora politics, Indian left, Indo-Aryan, Indo-Iranian, Indo-Islamic culture, Kabir comment, Kashmir Pandits, Kathak, Mughal India, Persian civilization, Sadarang, South Asian high culture, Taj Mahal, Urdu culture, Vedic continuity37 Comments

I’ve found myself drifting further left than I expected this year. Much of that is circumstantial, being involved in local activism in the United States naturally places one within progressive coalitions. Yet even in this frame, my ideological compass is firmly rooted in some admiration for Brahminical continuity and Bharat Mata as civilizational anchor.

At times I speculate on where Bharat truly ends. Is it the Hindu Kush? The Iranian plateau? The Persian world has always seemed to me about 20–30% Indianise; its mythology, musicality, and memory bear the imprint of the Indo-Aryan stream more than the Indo-European one, no matter how insistently modern Iranians lean toward a Westward identification.

This brings me to a provocative thesis I’ve often floated: that Brahmins are the civilisational custodians of the Indian subcontinent, and that their displacement often signals a broader cultural erasure. The tragedy of the Kashmiri Panditsis not merely a community’s trauma, but a warning. Without Brahminical continuity, Vedic frameworks falter. Hinduism in Pakistan and Bangladesh remains vulnerable precisely because it lacks the embedded authority and supervisory function of Brahmin elites to anchor Vedic traditions and calibrate resistance to incessant Islamisation. Continue reading Caste in America

Vantara, Caste, and the Fragile Commons

October 2, 2025X.T.MBahá’í, Caste, Diaspora, Hinduism, India, Indian Subcontinent, Pakistan, Partition, Postcolonialism & the Global South, Race, X.T.MAmbani, animal welfare, Bahá’í, blog culture, Brown Pundits, caste, commentariat, desi discourse, Dharma, Dr. Lalchand, Hinduism, Identity, Indian politics, interfaith, Kabir, megafauna, Modernity, Pakistan, Privilege, South Asia, Vantara66 Comments

I was speaking with Dr. Lalchand about a number of things, from Anant Ambani’s wildlife project to the recent caste discourse on Brown Pundits. Both, strangely enough, converge around the theme of scrutiny; of who gets to build, who gets to critique, and who sets the rules of engagement.

Let’s start with Vantara. Anant Ambani’s wildlife refuge is coming under sustained criticism. But I ask: why shouldn’t Bharat, arguably the only major civilisation that views animals as divinely inspired, have a world-class zoo or rescue center? If done with sensitivity and vision, this could be a profound expression of India’s Hindu civilisational ethos.

Vantara houses over 200 elephants, 50 bears, 160 tigers, 200 lions, 250 leopards, and 900 crocodiles; albeit imported from across the world into the baking flatlands beside an oil refinery. The scale is staggering. Yes, there are questions: about captive animal welfare, about the case of Pratima the elephant, about transparency. But we should also be able to think of Indian megafauna conservation at global scale especially in a nation where sacred animals are part of dharmic memory.

America had its Gilded Age. The robber barons left behind libraries, parks, and museums. Can’t India do the same? Or do we reflexively dismiss anything built by wealth as vanity? Can there not be a deeper Dharma behind patronage?

And that brings me yet again to caste, controversy, and the structure of Brown Pundits. Continue reading Vantara, Caste, and the Fragile Commons

Caste and the Structure of Discourse

October 1, 2025October 1, 2025X.T.MBahá’í, Brown Pundits, Caste, Civilisation, Culture, Geopolitics, Hinduism, History, India, Indian Subcontinent, Language, Partition, Postcolonialism & the Global South, Politics, Race, Religion, X.T.MAshkenazi, Brahminism, Brown Pundits, caste, Commentary, discourse, elite adaptation, Hinduism, Identity, intermarriage, Modi, Nehru, Politics, Privilege, race and caste, social hierarchy, Sociology, South Asia, structural critique, upper caste, WASP23 Comments

I’ve come to realise that it’s often more productive to write full posts than to engage in fragmented comment threads. The richness of thought requires a form that can hold tension, contradiction, and nuance but comments, by design, resist that.

The Upper-Caste Template of South Asian Dharmic Discourse

Take, for example, sbarrkum, who shares personal reflections and images from his life on the common board. While one might raise questions about permissions or boundaries, it’s also important to respect dialectical differences in how people choose to engage. There’s no single valid mode of expression.

That brings me to a broader reflection: how the very structure of discourse in Dharmic South Asia has long been shaped by upper-caste templates; especially under Western influence. Over two centuries, upper castes have Brahmanised, Saffronised, Persianised, and then Westernised themselves, adopting and enforcing norms of discourse, authority, and ‘rationality.’

Why Intermarriage Doesn’t Erase Hierarchy Continue reading Caste and the Structure of Discourse

Brown Pundits and the Echo Chamber Problem

September 30, 2025X.T.MBrown Pundits, Caste, Hinduism, India, Indian Subcontinent, Partition, Postcolonialism & the Global South, X.T.MAnti-Muslim Bias, Balakot, Brahminical, Brown Pundits, caste, commentariat, Diplomacy, Echo Chamber, Freedom of expression, Geopolitics, Hinduism, Hypergamy, India, Intercaste Marriage, Islam, moderation, Modi, Pahalgam, Pakistan, Privilege, South Asia, Trump8 Comments

The Echo Chamber of the Commentariat

It has been on my mind that Brown Pundits, for all its liveliness, risks drifting into an echo chamber. The commentariat is our lifeblood: their activity sustains the blog far more than page views alone. And yet, the very strength of that community can also be its blind spot.

I do not want Kabir to end up being the Cassandra of BP, always warning of decline, and being proved right in the end. If we are not careful, we could slide into a right-wing echo chamber where challenging voices fade, and the capacity for deep interrogation, the core of what makes BP unique, is diminished.

Pahalgam and the Question of Narrative Continue reading Brown Pundits and the Echo Chamber Problem

Homebound with Ishaan Khatter

September 29, 2025September 29, 2025X.T.MBahá’í, Brown Pundits, Caste, Culture, India, Iran, Islam & the Middle East, Pakistan, Partition, Postcolonialism & the Global South, X.T.MAssimilation, Bahá’í, Balakot, Bollywood, Brown Pundits, commentariat, Dalit, Diaspora, Geopolitics, Hinduism, Homebound, Identity, India, Indian Cinema, Ishaan Khatter, Islam, Janhvi Kapoor, Kabirification, Oscars, Pahalgam, Pakistan, Persian culture, Poverty Porn, Streisand Effect, Vectors148 Comments

Last night Dr. Lalchand & I watched Homebound, India’s submission to the Oscars, at Apple Cinemas in Cambridge, Mass. This sad film follows a Dalit (Chandan Kumar) and a Muslim (Mohammed Shoaib Ali) struggling against the odds during the pandemic, their solidarity fictionalized as a fragile bridge across India’s deepest divides.

On the surface, it is a familiar story: the disenfranchised facing systemic barriers. But what struck me was how privilege itself performed disenfranchisement. Ishaan Khatter, brother to Shahid Kapoor, plays the marginalized Muslim. Janhvi Kapoor, descended from Bollywood royalty, embodies a Dalit woman. Vishal Jethwa, a bright-eyed Gujarati, portrays the Bhojpuri Dalit lead. This is not unique to India; Hollywood, too, casts elites as workers. Yet it raises the question: when poverty is performed rather than lived, is it “Dalit-washing”?

Poverty, Emotion, and Representation

Watching the film, I reflected on poverty’s emotional landscape. For elites, emotions can be expansive, indulgent, aestheticized into art. For the working poor, emotions are often constrained by survival — narrowed into necessity. Homebound tried to humanize its characters, but I wondered whether it romanticized what in practice is a relentless narrowing of possibility.

The West rewards this narrative. Parasite in Korea, Iranian cinema, Slumdog Millionaire — poverty & Global South tribulations as spectacle becomes “poverty porn.” The Guardian gave Homebound four stars. Great art often tilts melancholic, yes, but here the melancholia is curated for Western consumption.

Identity, Vectors, and Islamicate Selfhood

More unexpectedly, the film stirred something personal. I realized how much I have vacated my own Islamic identity. It was not traumatic. As a Bahá’í with Persian cultural roots, I found overlap — even comfort — in Hindu traditions. Dalits, in their rapid Hinduization, represent one vector of assimilation; Muslims and scheduled-caste Muslims, often in tension, another. Homebound imagines solidarity, but in life these vectors pull unequally. Continue reading Homebound with Ishaan Khatter

The Changing Demographics of Undivided India (1900–2025)

September 25, 2025September 25, 2025X.T.MCaste, Civilisation, Geopolitics, Hinduism, History, India, Indian Subcontinent, Pakistan, Partition, Postcolonialism & the Global South, Politics, Religion, X.T.Magriculture, Bangladesh, Bengal, Canal Colonies, Colonial & Postcolonial Studies, Colonialism Categories: History, Demographics, Demography, fertility rates, global culture, history, India, Islamization, Muslim demographics, Pakistan, Partition, population growth, Punjab, Religion & Society, religious change, Richard Eaton, South Asia, UN projections18 Comments

South Asia’s demography is one of the great untold stories of the modern world. Too often we look at the subcontinent through today’s partitions — India, Pakistan, Bangladesh — but the real insight comes when we view the region as a single whole. Across 125 years, the balance of populations has shifted dramatically.

📊 1900: A Baseline

At the turn of the twentieth century, Muslims made up about 20% of undivided India’s population. The rest were overwhelmingly Hindu, with significant Sikh, Christian, Jain, and other minorities.

📊 1950: Partition and Realignment Continue reading The Changing Demographics of Undivided India (1900–2025)

On Hindutva, the good, the bad and the ugly.

August 24, 2025August 26, 2025IndosaurusAncient India, Caste, Civilisation, Colonialism, Culture, Hinduism, Hindutva, History, India, Indian Subcontinent, Race, Religioncaste, Hindutva, history, India, IVC, Shudra, Society, Varnas, vedic50 Comments

Yes, I enjoy Sergio and Clint too much. Anyway, put that image away and lets jump in…

The bad. The surge of unapologetic Hinduism has included attempted rehabilitation of its enduring shame. Casteism.

Normally I flee from caste related conversations like the plague, but I’ve started to see a lot of attempts in writing and in speeches attempting to justify the intent and practice. I want to add my voice to the pushback.

One argument I’ve seen online is that in Vedic Hinduism the Shudra Varna only consists of people who are relegated to a punished status (due to violation of Vedic laws). That there are only 3 Varnas as such, (all commoners are Vaishyas), and instead there are various Jatis. The British then supposedly classified Jatis into 4 Varnas (inventing the caste system in the process).

The other (by Sai Deepak) is that Shudra is not a term of disrespect but they are considered as part of the earth and mother earth is worshipped. As the providers to the upper varnas they are a respected and essential part of society.

Continue reading On Hindutva, the good, the bad and the ugly.