Abstract

Today's organizations face new challenges thrown by changing demographics and

increasing diversity in the workplace. Differences generate conflicts and are
manifested as discriminatory practices that reduce both individual and
organizational effectiveness. Existing literature highlights several factors including
gender and caste as discriminatory factors operating in Indian workplace. An
exploratory study using Critical Incident Technique was conducted to identify
discriminatory factors that are prevalent in Indian workplace, nature of their
interactions and their influence on organizational decisions. The study revealed
gender, region of origin, education, marital status, age and caste as discriminatory
factors that affect a number of organizational decision events, viz., recruitment, job
allocation, transfers, promotion and termination. It was found that several of these
factors operate simultaneously in an organization.
INTRODUCTION
Discrimination is the cognitive and sensory capacity or ability to see fine
distinctions and perceive differences between objects, subjects, concepts
and patterns, or possess exceptional development of the senses. Used in this way to
identify exceptional discernment since the 17th century, the term begun to be used
as an expression of derogatory racial prejudice from the 1830s.

Considering, India there have been many discriminatory practices (race

discrimination, sex discrimination, age discrimination, language discrimination
etc) which not only affected the states progress but effected the India‟s overall
growth. Discriminatory laws such as redlining have existed in many countries. In
some countries, controversial attempts such as racial quotas have been used to
redress negative effects of discrimination. The effects of the discriminatory
practices were not only prevailing in India rather it had a very bad effect on the
whole economies of the other countries.

HISTORY ABOUT THE DISCRIMINATION

Discrimination has a long history throughout the world. Most societies, especially
the larger ones, have practiced some form and some degree of discrimination. In
fact, a notable trend (though by no means necessarily an always true law) is that
larger societies have had a larger propensity to discriminate. Why? Because of
their achievements. Larger societies, to reach the size that they were, had to
accomplish. They built extensive and complicated networks. Their engineering
was on a scale and level enough to support a large society. Their art was complex.
They had a formal language and writing system. All of these things were--and are-
-marvelous achievements. But couple with them the fact that for most of human
history, people lived only within their societies and had almost no contact with
peoples of different societies, and it becomes easy to see why discrimination
occurred. They saw others as foreign and "backward," not having accomplished as
much as they did.

From a list of all of the societies that ever existed, it is easy to pick out societies
that discriminated. Spain used to discriminate heavily against the Jews, who were
forced either to convert Catholicism or to leave Spain. The Spanish also created a
body--called the Inquisition--to persecute who were not like them. So, people

were persecuted for being Jews. If someone was thought to be a witch, the she or
he was also persecuted. Likely, homosexuals were also persecuted.

In South Africa, Australia, and the United States, the black and indigenous
populations have faced heavy persecution. Jim Crow laws in the United States,
intentionally imitated by South African and Australia, persecuted blacks.
Segregation was prevalent in all of these three countries. Blacks were illegally
prevented from voting. Violence against blacks was common. In the United
States, the native American population faced heavy discrimination. Their families
were broken up, the children were forced to go schools that would eradicate their
culture, and families were forced to abandon their original ways of life and live on
reservations.

Fortunately, the world as a whole is less tolerant of discrimination today than it

was in the past. Most nations have laws barring most, if not all, forms of
discrimination (discrimination based on sexual orientation is an exception, though,
and still faces lot discrimination across the world).

One specific barring of discrimination in the U.S. involves employment practices.

Employers are prevented by the law from discriminating against employees or
potential employees (during interviews).

DISCIMINATORY PRACTICES
 Racial discrimination
 Caste discrimination
 Sex discrimination
 Age discrimination
 Price discrimination
 Work place discrimination

There are many discriminatory practices, which effects the the economic growth of
the country as a whole. Considering the discriminatory practices in Work Place and
discrimination due to caste system and the Racial Discrimination
WORK PLACE DISCRIMINATION

If there is discrimination during the hiring process there is bound to be some sort of
discrimination at the workplace Even if an employer has systems in place to hinder
discrimination during the application stage, there will always be people who will
discriminate once the candidate is hired, due to their own prejudices.
Here is another graph from the survey
This is the graph country-wise:

This graph, which shows discrimination at the workplace, shows similar trends to
the one which showed discrimination while getting the job. Sure, there are
differences, but only Sweden‟s position has dramatically changed. It has moved
from Rank 1 (discrimination while applying) to somewhere in the middle of the list
(discrimination at workplace). On the face of this means (for Sweden) that once
you get a job you are protected from discrimination to a large extent…but this does
not seem to hold true for the other countries
From the graph below it does seem as if more people feel discriminated against
while applying for jobs than at the workplace, and while this is largely true, it can
vary country to country. In India fewer people felt discriminated against while on
the job (53 percent) as compared to those who felt discriminated against while
applying (64 percent).
 If one compares with the rest of the world though India is high on both lists – 5th
when it comes to discrimination while applying for a job and 2nd when it comes
to discrimination at the workplace.
The fairly high level of dissatisfaction in India could mean that people are just
upset when they don‟t get the promotion/raise/salary they feel they deserve. It is
certainly human nature to complain, in fact it‟s rare to hear anyone who is not
promoted say I deserve not getting promoted. Not that this should blind us to the
ugly fact that discrimination at the workplace does exist.
What the Kelly survey reveals about India isn’t pleasant. Over 50 percent of
those polled in India believed that they are discriminated against at the workplace,
for various reasons like age, gender, race and religion and a myriad other things.
Some findings:
 100 percent of those living in Uttaranchal, Bihar, and Jharkhand complain of
discrimination (in their own states) at the workplace.
 80 percent of people in Punjab complain of discrimination
 70 percent of those in Gujarat complain of discrimination
 58 percent of those in Karnataka complain of discrimination
Other states are lower down on the list, but detailed information was not available.
Those who feel discriminated against at the workplace complain of lower wages. A
study undertaken by the University Grants Commission in conjunction with
Princeton University (4,808 applications for 548 jobs advertised in English
newspapers over 66 weeks starting October 2005 were analyzed) reveals that
discrimination at the workplace often manifests itself as lower wages for the
discriminated group. The study enumerates that there is a discrepancy between the
wages of lower and upper castes in the “regular salaried urban labor market, about
15 percent lower wages for SC/ST”.
The same study also says that those from the lower castes tend to come from
disadvantaged backgrounds and can “enter the job market with weaker English
language and computer skills.”
So on one hand it is logical for companies to give lower wages to a person without
such skills if these skills are necessary to performance on the job. On the other
hand, there is something called “training” via which the person gets an opportunity
to improve himself.
The believe that a bright youngster with a desire to learn should be given the
necessary training/opportunity to brush up his language skills. Finally it’s the way
one thinks that matters. It is not necessary that everyone with language skills will
be good at their jobs or will exhibit good reasoning skills, and there are
innumerable instances of people who „talk‟ rather than „do‟. Also attitude at work
– by which, a strong desire to learn and succeed – can go a long way in improving
performance.
Affirmative action from Infosys has been in the news (Feb 08):
Having already trained around 100 graduate and postgraduate science students free
of cost as a pilot project in 2007, Infosys has written to the social justice and
empowerment ministry, offering to continue the training programmed for poor
students, mainly from the Scheduled Castes (SC) and Other Backward Classes
(OBC).
It is necessary for the companies that they should take the training programs
irrespective of their race or religion or gender. This type of training will work to
remove discrimination only if the reason for discrimination is a lack of certain soft
skills, but if the reason is racial which leads to the work place discrimination.
Overall all though we need to keep certain things in perspective, there may be job
discrimination in India due to various complex factors, but this problem exists all
over the world. A certain section of the populace will always be prejudiced and we
need to keep fighting job discrimination as if it is a disease. Discrimination can
only harm progress and harm business too as the best talent is not used. Another
thing – Racism is only one of the reasons for discrimination at the workplace.
Many of us get so worked up about this that we forget that there is plenty of other
kinds of discrimination as well – age and gender are both significant factors and
more important in India than race.
*The Kelly survey analyzed results from 70,000 job seekers in 28 countries.

CASTE SYSTEM AND DISCRIMINATION PRACTICES

Caste as a system
Caste is a very old and indigenous system, conceptualized, developed and
practiced exclusively in India. It is difficult for the western world to
understand its role – past or present – in Indian society or because of its
complete localization and unfamiliarity to see it in its totality.
Assimilation of different social groups without conversion- In the past, caste
assimilated numerous social groups – immigrants, locals, tribal, professionals
or others into its mainstream without any conversion. It assigned each
incoming new group a separate caste identity and made them its integral part
in due course of time.
This way, neither it disturbed its existing internal social order nor prevented
new groups to join the mainstream. It did not annihilate their faith, way of
living, internal order, customs, culture or language. Instead, it gave them
freedom to prosper according to their internal rhythm.
Caste regarded as a natural institution by Hindus – Indian society regards
family, extended family, Kula, Caste and religion as fundamental social
institutions. An individual is a natural member of a family, which is a unit of
an extended family, extended family of Kula, Kula of a tribe (Vish) – and a
tribe of a Jana of Jati (Caste). Caste is second only to the family in widening a
person’s social radius and in getting importance in his/her private and
occupational life.
Equal status to all within a caste - All the members within a caste enjoy equal
social status vise-a-vise other castes. They share moments of joy and sorrow.
A person’s relation with members of his caste are closer than with those
belonging to other castes. Caste values, beliefs, prejudices, injunctions as well
as distortions of reality becomes an indivisible part of a person’s psyche and
conscience.
Internalized caste norms define an individual role in the society. Earlier a
person felt good and loved, when one lived up to these norms, and anxious
and guilty, when he transgressed them.
Caste providing social security and stability – Caste provides to all its
members social security and stability. Each caste maintains its own rules,
regulations, customs, way of life and controls the conduct of its members. It
encourages self-discipline, conscious, self-control, self-direction. Earlier,
instead of government, elders (having sense of belonging, not a desire to
exercise authority) took care of maintaining discipline within the caste and
helped its destitute/helpless members.
Castes as a series of vertical parallels – The key, to understand the caste
system, is not in seeing it as a framework of hierarchical layers of social order
each fitting neatly below the other, as pointed out by census operations done
during imperial rule, but as a series of vertical parallels. Each caste is an
independent entity, with its own hierarchy, based either on a tribal identity or
an occupational identity.
Inter-dependence an integral part of caste system – In ancient and medieval
India, all people living in a village or city were bound together by economic
and social ties. All castes living in a local area, whether high or low, had a
strong bond of mutual dependence, caring, sharing and supporting each
other in fulfilling different kind of needs. There was hardly any room for any
section of society to consider itself, as being placed in greater or lesser
disadvantageous position with reference to another. Concept of forwards or
backwards or feeling of exploitation of lower strata by upper castes was
almost non-existent at that time. Industrialization and modernization have
changed the scene.
Some people blame Caste system for its being ’discriminatory’ in
nature. Others say, it serves the interests of “haves”and enhances the
agonies of “have-nots”. It is an anamoly, that still it is only the ‘have-nots’,
who cling more tightly to their caste identities today.
Caste system has been criticized for -

Giving importance to birth -_Caste system has been alleged for giving rise to
disparities in the society. Because it gives importance to birth in determining
social status of a person. But same is the position in Western world also,
where wealth determines social status, which is also acquired through birth.
There also exists a sharp distinction between elites and common man.
Critics claim that in return for centuries of suppression/oppression of the
lower castes on the basis of birth in the past, present generation of upper
castes is accountable and punishable and make reparations for sins/historical
wrong done by their ancestors. Justice ‘Social, economic and political’ never
allows to punish somebody for the crimes committed by somebody else.
Access to education – It is alleged that upper castes has kept its monopoly on
education to reinforce its traditional dominance and prevented lower castes
from getting educated. When British rulers allowed legally admission to all
irrespective of caste or creed in government schools, higher castes opposed
admission of the children belonging to lower strata.
It is only a half truth. British rulers did not bother much about mass
education. It was not so much because of discrimination that backward castes
were debarred or denied access to education, as for -

 Modern education system being very costly and therefore, unaffordable by

masses. The costly nature of education tended to make it a monopoly of
the richer classes and city dwellers.
 The medium of instruction was a foreign language – English.
 Lower-castes did see any immediate use of education. It was more
important for them to work and arrange two square meals day rather than
spending on education. However, an impoverished group caste Hindus in
 search of livelihood looked upon modern education as means to earn their
living respectfully and devoted their scarce resources on it.

The relentless effort of missionaries and the reformers could educate a very
small number of people from lower-castes.

Ranking – In the past, considerations of self-discipline, hygiene, cleanliness,

morality, knowledge, spirituality of different castes and usefulness of their
work to the society as a whole were the factors to determine social,
economic or political status of a group in society vise-a vise others. Higher a
caste, purer it was considered, and greater were the self-restrictions on its
behavior through rituals.
Mobility – Mobility of individuals from one caste to another was restricted in
the past. But upward mobility of a group in the social scale was though
difficult, but not impossible. Ancient India had allowed upward mobility of a
caste possible through good deeds by adopting more orthodox practices,
cleaner habits, self-discipline and observance of rituals or the position of a
caste could be improved. This way, lower-castes were encouraged to follow
discipline in life. Now different castes are racing to get a tag of backward
castes.
Wealth – Doors for honor or wealth were always open to deserving
individuals/groups of any caste. History is the proof that even the lowest rank
attained even sovereignty in India such as Maratha Kings, who fought their
way up-to the throne against Mohammedan and commanded respect of all
Indians. From fourteenth to the eighteenth century, soldiers came from all
strata of society including the lowest in the ritual term. There was no
discrimination in the recruitment and treatment of soldiers on caste basis.
Rajput status was given to soldiers.
RACIAL DISCRIMINATION & ITS RESPONSE
Very large majorities around the world say people of different races and ethnicities
should be treated equally. In nearly all countries surveyed, large majorities agree
that governments should take action to prevent racial discrimination, and in most
of them majorities think they need to do more.

In 15 out of 16 countries surveyed, large majorities say that employers should not
be allowed to discriminate based on race or ethnicity and that it is the government's
responsibility to stop this from happening.

In 11 of the 16 countries, most believe treatment of different races has grown more
equal over the course of their lifetime, but in five countries this is not the case.

These are some of the findings from a poll of 14,896 people in the Americas,
Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Africa conducted by WorldPublicOpinion.org, a
collaborative research project involving research centers from around the world
and managed by the Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) at the
University of Maryland. The primary funder of the study was the Oak Foundation.

Interviews were conducted in 16 countries between January 10 and February 29,

2008: Azerbaijan, China, Egypt, France, Great Britain, India, Indonesia, Iran,
Mexico, Nigeria, the Palestinian territories, Russia, South Korea, Turkey, Ukraine,
and the US. These nations represent 58 percent of the world population. Margins of
error range from +/-3 to 4 percent.

WorldPublicOpinion.org has released the

poll in advance of International Day for
the Elimination of Racial Discrimination
(March 21). This year also marks the 60th
anniversary of the UN General Assembly's
adoption of the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights, which declares that all are
entitled to the same rights and freedoms,
regardless of race, language, religion, sex
or other status.

Racial and Ethnic Equality

Majorities in all 16 nations consider it

important for "people of different races
and ethnicities to be treated equally." In 13 countries, majorities say this is "very
important." On average, 90 percent say that treating people of different races and
ethnicities equally is important, with 69 percent saying it is very important. No
more than 13 percent in any country say it is not important.

Overwhelming majorities say racial equality is very important in Mexico (94%),

China (90%), and Britain (87%), along with large majorities in the United States
(79%), Indonesia (75%), Turkey (73%), Egypt (71%), South Korea (71%), Nigeria
(71%), the Palestinian territories (70%), France (69%), Azerbaijan (68%), and Iran
(62%). Smaller numbers agree in Russia (37%), India (44%), and the Ukraine
(50%).

Wide Support for Government Action

Majorities around the world agree that governments should act to ensure that
minorities are treated equally. On average, 79 percent agree that the government
"should make an effort to prevent discrimination based on a person's race or
ethnicity," while just 12 percent feel that the government should not be involved.

Support for government action is greatest in South Korea (96%), Mexico (94%),
China (90%), Nigeria (90%), and Indonesia (88%). Very large majorities also
favor such efforts in Britain (85%), France (85%), the United States (83%), Turkey
(79%) and Iran (76%).

Only in India does less than half of the

public (46%) favor government action.
Seventeen percent oppose such action
while large numbers are uncertain.

Many Think Governments Should Do

More

In 10 of the 16 nations polled, the most

common view is that governments should
go further to prevent racial and ethnic
discrimination. On average across all
nations polled, 54 percent say the
government should do more, while 22
percent feel it is already doing enough.
Just 5 percent volunteer that their government already does too much.

Overwhelming numbers of South Koreans (91%) and Mexicans (86%) support

greater government efforts along with 79 percent of Nigerians. Large majorities
also support further government action in China (70%), France (68%), and
Indonesia (66%) while more modest majorities hold this view in Britain (54%) and
Turkey (52%). Pluralities agree in the Palestinian territories (50%) and Ukraine
(46%).Indians, Americans, Russians and several Muslim publics express more
mixed views.

The largest percentage opposed to government action against discrimination is

found in India, where 38 percent say that the government should not be involved
(17%) or that it is doing too much (21%). However, as Yashwant Deshmukh,
director of the WPO network's Indian partner Team C Voter, comments, this lower
number may be due in part to the robust affirmative action programs in favor of the
lower castes implemented by the Indian government. He explains that the question
of race or ethnicity is seen "as more relevant to the Indian caste system."

Americans hold divided views: 55 percent say the government is already doing
enough (38%) or should not be involved (17%) but a robust 45 percent say the
government should do more. Results are similar in Russia, where 39 percent say
the government is doing enough (24%), too much (4%) or should not be involved
(11%) but 35 percent think it should do more.

Three Muslim countries have mixed views. In Iran two out of five (40%) say the
government already does enough to prevent racial and ethnic discrimination and
another 10 percent say it should not do anything. But nearly a third (31%) think it
should do more. Egyptians are almost evenly divided between those who say the
government should take further action (37%) and those who say it does enough
(36%). In Azerbaijan, 34 percent say the government does enough and 33 percent
want it to do more.
Majorities See Improvement

In 11 of the 16 nations polled, majorities

say that over the course of their lifetime
people of different races and ethnicities
have come to be treated more equally. On
average, 59 percent say people of different
races and ethnicities are treated more
equally than in the past, including 20
percent who say much more equally. Only
19 percent believe people are treated less
equally than before and 14 percent say
there has been no real change.
The United States and Indonesia have the
largest majorities (82% in both) saying
that racial and ethnic minorities enjoy
greater equality than in the past, followed
by Britain (79%), China (78%), and Iran
(76%). The United States (42%), Britain
(39%) and China (34%) have the largest
percentages saying such minorities are
treated "much more equally."

Palestinians are the one public that does

not perceive such progress. A majority of
Palestinians (54%) say people of different races and ethnicities are now treated less
equally than in the past while only 27 percent say they get better treatment.

Views are mixed about whether minorities are treated more equally in four
countries: Nigeria (43% more equal, 45% less equal, 10% no change) and three
former Soviet states, Ukraine (36% more equal, 11% less, 38% no real change),
Azerbaijan (39% more, 19% less, 31% no change) and Russia (more 37%, less
20%, no change 25%).
CONCLUSION
Thus, we can conclude that discriminatory policies lead to many problems in the economy. It
leads to many conflicts, racism and various caste related problems. Though the discrimination is
reducing, but government here has to play some major roles to put a check for the problems
related to the discrimination. The work place discrimination has been dominating in many
countries which is creating a real problem for the companies growth which finally lead to
economic slow down.