ABSTRACT
In urban areas, social interaction has done the job of reducing the intensity of discrimination, more than the anti-discrimination movements. Also, positive discrimination, like the reservation system, has given the opportunity to the lower caste to become active in social interaction. The objective of this study is to explore various changes in the caste system and to know the experience of migrated people in urban areas, especially who are Dalit and of other Scheduled Castes, in terms of their social interaction. The theme of the interview was their experiences in terms of social interaction with people from higher caste background. Six informal and unstructured in-depth interviews were conducted in Mumbai. Three among the six interviewees were students, one of the students being a Dalit and other two were of Scheduled Caste from Nagaland and Manipur, two taxi drivers, both being Dalit and a street vendor of scheduled caste, was interviewed. Caste system is not visually prominent in the traditional sense, but, the caste mindset still prevails and it influences the social interactions in urban area. Due to secularization, the higher caste people in the urban area seems to be away from their caste identity, but, when it comes to social interaction, they choose to maintain a prominent distance from lower caste people, only if they are in the knowledge of the caste background.
