Broadbasing Process in India and Dalits

Broadbasing is a process through which an increasing number of social groups enter the mainstream of social, political and economic activities and progressively derive the same advantages from the society as the groups already in the mainstream. Broadbasing occurs alongside and often in response to the challenge of the opposite process of marginalisation, the two processes operating at the expense of each other. Has the process of marginalisation, with the base of the power structure becoming narrower and society consequently less democratically and intensely polarised, a process which was dominant under colonial rule given way to a broadbasing process in the 50 years after independence? This paper takes a serious and discursive look at the operation of the two processes, in Indian society, focusing on the changing social, political and economic status of dalits over the period.