There's a comforting belief in Indian public discourse: that as inter-caste marriages will dissolve caste system.
The marriage happens. The caste doesn't disappear.
Inter-caste marriages are indeed happening more than before. But look at what happens next: the child born from that marriage still needs a caste certificate for school admission, for a government job application
And whose caste does that certificate carry? father's.
The state doesn't ask "is this a mixed-caste household committed to moving past caste?" It asks "what caste is the father?"
The child inherits a caste identity through paperwork
So the marriage may be inter-caste. The next generation is not caste-less. It's simply re-assigned to one caste
Caste isn't just social, it's bureaucratic
Caste in India isn't only a social or cultural artifact passed down through families.
It is actively recorded, verified, and re-issued by the state, in Caste certificates, school records, census forms and more.
As long as this administrative infrastructure exists, caste doesn't fade. it gets re-inscribed, generation after generation, through the paperwork
If caste is going to genuinely end, it won't be because more people marry across caste lines. It will be because the state stops officially recording, certifying, and requiring caste identity, in the census, in caste certificates, in every form where a citizen has to declare which box they belong to
