Shudras in Ancient India

Shudras are the lowest in the institution of Varna (caste) system. It is an exclusively Indian phenomenon, created to maintain a gradation in Hindu social order and broaden the scope of enslavement serfdom. In the Aryan social life the biologically unscientific and artificial caste system was not the growth of a single age, it took centuries to reach in its present form. Varna system became so deep rooted that it gave rise to social injustice and colossal vice like untouchability, slavery, degradation, uprooting from land and ancestral property, exploitation at every stage in life to a vast majority of non Aryan races or Shudras. In the Purush-Sukta of Rig-Veda there is mention of four varnas (castes), which are presumed to be originated from the supreme being. Brahmin from his mouth, Kshatriya from arms, Vaishya from thighs and Shudra from his feet. From Vedic period to the middle of Sutras and the Buddhist period fourfold division represented these classes as a division of labour and Shudras became the servile class, the slaves of Aryans. The present book traces the historical evolution of the Shudras and their wretched conditions in the ancient period of history, which the eminent scholars like H.H. Wilson, Dr. P.V. Kane, and Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, Chanchreek and Chandra have narrated in their research oriented papers. This publication will serve as an authentic reference tool on the historically abused Shudra communities.