Inside–Outside Two Views of Social Change In Rural India

01 March, 2014

BS Baviskar and DW Attwood

Sage India, 472 pages, Rs 950

Is poverty in rural India a permanent condition? Are villagers socially immobilised by a rigid caste system, limited resources and economic exploitation? Challenging the common stereotypes about the passivity, fatalism and stagnation of Indian village life, this book profiles villagers who have broken through the constraints of poverty and inequality to become innovative and socially mobile. The two authors—a sociologist who grew up in a village in western India and a British statistician who studies social change in the region—offer a rich variety of both insider and outsider perspectives