I Surveyed 200+ Indian Villages! Busting 10 Myths On Rural India

As an NRI I was crazy about India and wished to see it inside out. After moving to India, I enrolled on surveying villages for the Madhya Pradesh elections (with Arthashatra org — credits at end of article).

The goal is Jaati-Samikaran — find the caste breakdown of a district and push it into a statistical model to predict voting patterns.

How we did it — We’d pick a constituency and drive the car literally into any village. Any village! We’d take any left turn. Any right turn. Whatever we felt. It was so liberating to see India that way. We never knew who we’d meet. Or what we’d see.

Here are interesting Myths I broke from my experience!

Myth 1: SC, ST Same Thing, No?

We Indians speak the castes of SC and ST in the same breath. — “SCSTQUOTA”. My my — you have no idea. There is a marked, visible, talkable difference between them. We could tell. From a distance.

Schedule Castes (SC) were like us Urbans. They dress like us, they look like us, they drive vehicles like us, and they eat roti, subji like us.

The Schedule Tribes (ST) were unlike us. Their cottages, thatched. Their poverty, stronger. Their bodies, beautiful.

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