JAMIA MILLIA ISLAMIA

FACULTY OF LAW

SOCIOLOGY PROJECT: -
DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIOLOGY IN INDIA

SUBMITTED TO-
MR. RASHEED CA SIR
Assistance Professor
Faculty Of Law,
Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi.

SUBMITTED BY-
USAMA
B.A.LL.B.(HONS.)-1st SEMESTER
(REGULAR)
BATCH: 2022-2027
 Table of contents

Table of contents................................................................................................................................... 1
Acknowledgment ................................................................................................................................... 2
What is there in this project ................................................................................................................ 3
Introduction ........................................................................................................................................... 4
Development of sociology in colonial India ....................................................................................... 5
Professionalization of Sociology in India ........................................................................................... 6
Growth of sociology post-independence............................................................................................ 7
Sociological research and education in India .................................................................................... 8
Conclusion .............................................................................................................................................. 9
Bibliography ........................................................................................................................................ 10

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 Acknowledgment

I would like to express my special thanks to my Sociology teacher Mr.

Rasheed CA for giving me this opportunity to write this project on the topic
DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIOLOGY IN INDIA which has given me a
chance to research and read about this great topic and ultimately increased my
knowledge. Thank you, sir.

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What is there in this project
 Human beings have always been interested in knowing and
thinking about their society, but the subject of sociology came into
existence after the French Revolution.

 Auguste Comte coined the term sociology in 1838.

 Comte proposed a scientific study of society because the

knowledge thus gathered could be used for social betterment.

 Emile Durkheim and Max Weber made a major contribution to the

development of sociology in France and Germany respectively.

 As a discipline, sociology has developed tremendously after the

Second World War.

 In India, the development of sociology can be traced to the colonial

rule.

 With the founding of the Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal,

sociological researches received a tremendous boost.

 The first full-fledged department of sociology was started in

Bombay University in 1919.

 Village studies began in India after the independence especially

because of the collaboration of Indian sociologists with their
American counterparts.

 After independence, the number of sociology departments has

increased in India and so is the increase in research projects.

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 Introduction

An attempt is made in this assignment to trace the development of sociology, the newest
social science, in India and in that process to try to explicate the relationship between
development and the cultural milieu in which it has occurred. That milieu has changed much
and radically during the last six decades or so when the discipline developed to its present
stage. Sociology is a relatively young discipline. Although its roots go back to about three or
four centuries, it was only in the nineteenth century that it started assuming its present role of
the science of society in the sense of the systematic study of all societies in space and time.
Broadly, the intellectual climate in western Europe, which itself was closely linked with the
political, economic and other forces of the day, favoured the development of this discipline.
The popularity of sociology in U.S.A was due to the many problems which a vast, rich and
rapidly developing country had to face such as urbanisation, immigration, ethnicity, crime and
prostitutions. These scattered remarks on the development of social sciences in the Western
world are not only intended to serve as background to my discussion of the development of
sociology in India. Sociology, as a discipline, came much after the contributions made by social
thinkers, philosophers, administrators who worked at understanding the Indian society, in
general, as well as studying some specific aspects of Indian society, such as law, family,
religion, caste system and so on. It is the contributions made by the Indologists such as Henry
Maine, Alfred Lyell, etc. which helped the development of sociology in India. They
emphasised the need to preserve the indigenous social institutions found in Indian society rather
than destroying them and imposing an alien way of life on her people. They recognised the past
glory of Indian cultural and literary tradition. Besides the Indologists there were the British
administrators who made extensive study of Indian people, their races and cultures. Most of
these studies helped to generate a body of knowledge, preserved in the Census Reports,
Imperial Gazetteers, District Gazettes, etc. as well as in books and monographs which are
referred by social anthropologists and sociologists even today.

The origins of sociology in India go back to the days when British officials discovered
that knowledge of Indian culture and social life was indispensable to the smooth functioning
of government. Since then, many British officials and missionaries had made efforts to collect
and record information regarding the life and culture of their Indian subjects. And it is in
context of the development of sociology in India. Indian sociologist had made a prominent
contribution to the development of indigenous studies of Indian society. It is difficult to

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understand the origin and development of sociology in India without reference to its imposing
history. So, I would like to first talk about its development in colonial era and then its
professionalization and will also discuss its growth in post-independence.

Development of sociology in colonial India

Sociology developed in India in the colonial interests and intellectual curiosity of the
western scholars on the one hand, and the reactions of the Indian scholars on the other.
British officials had to require the knowledge of customs, manners and institutions in Indian
society for better administrations. Thus, they acquire the knowledge of this subject, and
Christian missionaries interested in understanding local language, culture and manners. These
overlapping interests led to a series of tribal, caste, village and religious community studies in
India.

During the course of exercising their rule in India, the British officials realized that
for smooth administration, it was important that they acquired knowledge of Indian society
and culture. Information was also required about fluent families and their customs, which
could be used for revenue collection. If local societies were administrated according to their
laws and customs, it was thought, there would be peace and harmony. Hence, their laws and
customs needed to be recorded meticulously in detail: This prompted the origin of sociology
in India.

In 1774, William Jones founded the Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal, the aim of
which was to study 'nature and man' in India.

The first attempt in this regard was made in 1769, under the supervision of Henry
Verelst, the Governor of Bengal and Bihar. Francis Buchanan carried out a survey of people
in Bengal in 1807. A French missionary in Mysore, Abbe Dubois, wrote the famous book
titled Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies in 1816, in which he described the
characteristics of caste system and the interaction between castes. In 1820, Walter Hamilton's
published a gazetteer, A Geographical, Statistical and Historical Description of Hindustan
and Adjacent Countries, where in an attempt was made to estimate India's population.

These works prepared the ground for more systematic studies that were undertaken in
the second half of the nineteenth century. The British government conducted the first all-
India Census in 1871. The need for census was felt because information was required for

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several purposes, such as famine relief, sanitation and control of epidemics, etc. Besides this,
the need was also to collect details about people's lives before they disappeared because of
social and culture change. With the efforts of colonial officials (such as Wilson, Riley,
Baines, Blunt, Thurston, O'Malley, Hutton, etc.), Census became an invaluable source of
information for data on population, society, and cultural life.

British administration was also interested in understanding the classical Indian

literature, for many ideas according to which people led their lives were embedded in it.
Form the early days, they engaged scholar in Sanskrit and Arabic to assist their judges in
deciding cases involving religious practices, customs, and laws. With the help of Sanskrit
scholars, a book on Hindu law in English was prepared in 1776 for British judges. The
founder-president of the Royal Asiatic Society of Bengal, William Jones, had special interest
in Sanskrit One of the main interests of his journal called Journal of Asiatic Society of Bengal
(1784) was the publication of articles based on a study of Sanskrit and Arabic literature.
During the nineteenth century, Max Muller, a German scholar, translated several classical
Indian texts into German, which were later translated into English.

The later scholars, writing in the last decades of the nineteenth century, made use of
these writings. For example, Henry Maine, in both of his books, Ancient Law (1861) and
Village Communities in the East and West (1871), referred to the writings on India. He had
also visited India. Both Karl Marx and Max Weber, whose works were central to the
development of sociology also made use of the information from India.

Professionalization of Sociology in India

Despite all these early development Sociology had its formal beginning only in 1917 at
Calcutta University owing to the active interest and efforts by B. N. Seal. After that the subject
was handled by Radhakamal Mukharjee and B. N. Sarkar. But unfortunately, Sociology could
not make any development in its birth-place at Calcutta Thus, Sociology sketched a blank in
the eastern parts of India. On the other hand, story had been different in Western India. Bombay
University started Sociology by a grant of Government of India in 1914. And in Bombay
University the Department of Sociology was established in 1919 with Patrick Geddes at the
helm of affair. Patrick was joined by G. S. Ghurye and N. A. Toothi. This was indeed a tangible
step in the growth of Sociology in India. However, in 1921 another centre of influence in
Sociological theory and research was at Lucknow that it introduced Sociology in the

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Department of Economics and Sociology with Radhakamal Mukharjee as its head. Later,
Radhakamal Mukherjee was ably assisted by D. P. Mukerji and D. N. Majumdar. In South
India, Sociology made its appearance in 1928 at Mysore University by the efforts of B. N. Seal
and A. F. Wadia. And in the same year Sociology was introduced in Osmania University at the
undergraduate level. In 1930 Pune had started teaching of Sociology and Anthropology under
the head of Irawati Karve. The development of the Sociology was uneven and not encouraging
during 1917 and 1946. During this period, only Bombay was the main centre of activity in
Sociology. Bombay attempted a synthesis between the Indological and Ethnological trends and
thus initiated a distinctive line of departments. During this period, many scholars who richly
contributed to the promotion of Sociological studies and research in India were produced by
Bombay University. K. M. Kapadia, Irawati Karve, S. V. Karandikar, M. N. Srinivas, A. R.
Desai, I. P. Desai, M. S. Gore and Y. B. Damle are some of the outstanding scholars who
shaped the destiny of the discipline. And this helped in the establishment of the department of
Sociology.

Growth of sociology post-independence

The phase of expansion of Sociology in India began in 1952, with several factors
account in its growth. Central Government promote the Social Science research through a
formal organisation. In Bombay, Indian Sociological Society was established and Sociological
Bulletin was issued as the official organ of the society. This helped to a large extent in
constructing a forum for publication of Sociological literature. On the other hand, All India
Sociological Conference for professional interaction started by Lucknow School. Also the
policy makers of independent India pursued objectives of economic regeneration and social
development, and they recognized the role of the social sciences in attaining the objectives of
national reconstruction and development (Dhanagre, 1993:45). They defined the new task of
Sociology as social engineering and social policy science. It meant increased participation by
social scientists, particularly economists and sociologists, in research and social and economic
development (Singh 1986:8-9). At the same time heavy funding from Ford Foundation to save
India from sliding into the revolutionary communist path of development led many sociologists
in India to undertake researches in the field of community development also in the process of
strengthening the policy relevant researches were conducted. A major reason that contributed
to the growth of Sociology in the post-independence period can also be attributed to the policy
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of administration followed by Indian state declared the practice of untouchability in any form
an offence, and with the introduction of reservation for Scheduled Castes and Tribes (SCs and
STs) in the legislatures and jobs in the government and the public sector, a new field was
opened up for study to sociologists, though very few were aware of this fact (Srinivas,
1994:12). Indian society has a mosaic structure of agriculture and industries. This kind of
complex structure raises economic and social inequalities. These inequalities are based on the
ground of caste, class, and gender. The Indian society if facing change from agriculture to
market-based capitalism. The contradictions in society emerge new subjects like Sociology of
gender, Dalit studies, Sociology of tribe such as. In this period India have nearly half of the
total population illiterate and poor. This situation help to growth of urban slums point up this
process. The larger the city, the larger is the problem of urban poverty and its ghettoization.
Urban slum dwellers face with miserable condition. The dissatisfaction in the urban life is
enlarged leading to continued conflicts between urban middle classes and the slum dwelling
poor. The liberalization and opening of the economy have now added a new class of the ‘super-
rich’ to the urban social circumstances. This creates among urban middle classes as well as the
urban poor very complex forms of cultural and social tensions. Indian sociologists are yet to
devote their serious consideration to these issues if they want to follow the goal of equality and
to justify their relevance to the society at large. The result of social forces operating in our
society since independence, have led us to face with many unforeseen questions. These
influence both our society as well as the profession of Sociology. As such there is need to
reflect extremely on these problems and to organize us to meet with these challenges since
challenge is inbuilt in the process of change. It influences both individuals and societies.

Sociological research and education in India

Since independence, research in sociology got a significant boost in the country. Also
with the rapid development of the universities and colleges, and increase in the number of
research studies on different aspects of sociology. Many previous surveys of the establishment
of sociology in India present the process in different phases and trends, notably those by Backer
and Barnes (1961), Saran (1958), Bottomore (1962), Clinard and Elder (1965), Vidhyarthi
(1972), and the Indian Council of Social Sciences Research (ICSSR) (1972). Several studies
directed by sociologists were financed, sponsored and supported by several agencies. By the
UGC Review Committee on Sociology (1960) also emphasized another welcome trend in the
introduction of the courses on methods of social research as part of the MA syllabus. In the

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field of doctoral research, the progress in sociology has been notable. There are facilities of
doing research seen at the university department level and it does not exist at the college level.
The ICSSR and the UGC have suitable schemes for providing these facilities. The ICSSR,
which is the main agency for promoting research in sociology and social anthropology, has laid
down priorities in keeping with social goals.

Sociology is very popular subject in the universities and colleges of India today. Now
a day, out of 133 universities, approx. 85 universities have department of sociology. The origin
of Sociology in India traced to the period of 1920s. Firstly, teaching of Sociology started in
Bombay University as early as 1914 but the birth of academic sociology took place only with
the development of departments of Sociology in Bombay and Lucknow. Pre – independence
scholars have contributed to the foundation of sociology by providing a tradition in which
Sociology in India could grow and evolve (Unnithan et al., 1967).

Conclusion

The growth of sociology in India can be divided into three phases. In the first phase,
covering the period from 1769 to 1900, in this the foundation of sociology was laid down.
Sociology became a profession, a university subject, during the second phase, from 1901 to
1950. The third phase, beginning after India's independence, was marked by programmes of
planned development, increased interaction of Indian sociologists with their foreign
counterparts, availability of money for research, and intensification of research and
publications.

But the history of the development of sociology in India has not been much soothing.
The discipline of sociology was partly responsible for the survival of colonialism and feudalism
in princely states. The medieval mentality of Indian people is thus due to sociology,
anthropology and ethnology. Must be said that this discipline has not been worth its salt in
India.

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 Bibliography

1. Atal, Yogesh (1976), “Sociology in the Indian Campus”, in Giri Raj Gupta (ed), Main
cuttents in Indian Sociology (Vol. 1), New Delhi; Vikas pp.117-31.
2. Mukharjee, R. K. (1973), “Indian Sociology: Historical Development and Present
Problems”, Sociological Bulletin, 22(1): 29-58.
3. Mukharjee, Ramakrishna (1979), “Sociology of Indian Sociology, Bombay: allied
Publications.
4. Srinivas, M. N. and M. N. Panini (1973), “The Development of Sociology and Social
Anthropology in India”, Sociological Bulletin, 22(2): 179-215.
5. UGC (1978), Report on the Status of Teaching of Sociology and Social Anthropology,
Part I: Summary and Recommndations, (1979), Part II: Regional Reports, (1982),
Status Report on the Teaching of Sociology and Social Anthropology, New Delhi:
University Grants Commission.
6. Prof. Jhaverbhai Patel et al., “Rise and Development of Sociology in India”, ICRSH
(24-26 October 2019).
7. Vinayak Subhash Lashkar (2013), “Development of Sociology in India”
8. Srinivas, M.N. (1994), “Sociology in India and its Future”, Sociological Bulletin, Vol.
43, No.1.

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