and allowing for the emergence of new caste solidarities on a state-wide, even nation-wide basis. (Significantly, it was the so-called All India Veerashaiva Mahasabha which led the Lingayats in the agitation.) The liberal notions of welfare and equality which informed the Constitutional formulations for reservation at the time of Independence have long since given way to the struggle between dominant groups for a somewhat limited privilege. Despite the impressive strides both the Lingayats and Vokkaligas have made in the field of technical and other education (consider the large number of private medical and engineering institutions set up by the communities themselves in Karnataka) there is a reluctance to give up the privileges of backward status. Their vociferous demands have drowned out the more legitimate claims of other, far less articulate and numerically weak Backward Castes.
