ABSTRACT
This chapter considers that the point of which Harold Gould spoke has been reached, at least in Agra, and that, though the terms may be radically different, they are now to some extent foreseeable. The transitional period quickly came to a close with the achievement of independence in India. During the 1930's and early 1940's the attention of the Jatav elite centered upon a new problem. This was the independence movement and the position of the Jatavs in an independent India, though the latter issue was overshadowed to some extent by World War II. Politics and the whole governmental structure of patronage and development have integrated various individuals of the caste into higher levels of state and national organization. Politics, among the Agra Jatavs, is not just a matter of elections; it is, on the contrary, involved in the basic issues of day-to-day life and conversation.
