Sociology is a relatively young discipline in Europe, established about a century ago; in India, formal teaching began in 1919 at the University of Bombay.

In the 1920s, universities at Calcutta and Lucknow also started programmes in sociology and anthropology.

Today, most major Indian universities have departments of sociology, social anthropology, or anthropology.

Early Indian sociologists had to determine the role and relevance of sociology in India, as it was unclear what an Indian sociology would look like.

The Indian context posed specific questions: India experienced modernity under colonial rule, had an ancient civilisation alongside ‘primitive’ societies, and later faced sovereign development and democracy.

Founding figures of Indian sociology formulated new questions through the experience of ‘doing’ sociology in India.

Many early Indian sociologists and anthropologists entered the field by accident.

L.K. Ananthakrishna Iyer (1861-1937): began as a clerk, became a teacher, and was asked to assist with an ethnographic survey of Cochin in 1902.

Worked voluntarily while teaching at Maharajah’s College, Ernakulam, and later assisted in Mysore state surveys.

First self-taught anthropologist in India to gain national and international recognition; lectured at University of Madras and became Reader at University of Calcutta (1917-1932), helping establish the first post-graduate anthropology department.

Elected President of the Ethnology section of the Indian Science Congress, received an honorary doctorate in Germany, and conferred titles of Rao Bahadur and Dewan Bahadur.

Sarat Chandra Roy (1871-1942): began as an English teacher in Ranchi (1898) before practising law, which brought him into contact with tribal customs and society.

Developed interest in tribal anthropology through professional work as court interpreter in Ranchi.

Conducted intensive fieldwork among tribal communities in Chhotanagpur; published over 100 articles and monographs on the Oraon, Mundas, and Kharias.

Founded the journal Man in India in 1922, the earliest anthropology journal in India still in publication.

Ananthakrishna Iyer and Sarat Chandra Roy were pioneers of sociology and anthropology in early 1900s India, practising a discipline that did not yet exist and had no institutions to support it.

They were born, lived, and died in colonial India under British rule.

The next generation of Indian sociologists, including G.S. Ghurye, D.P. Mukerji, A.R. Desai, and M.N. Srinivas, were born later, with careers spanning the colonial and post-independence eras, helping establish formal institutions of Indian sociology.

G.S. Ghurye is considered the founder of institutionalised sociology in India, heading the first post-graduate sociology department at Bombay University for 35 years.

Ghurye guided numerous research scholars, founded the Indian Sociological Society and its journal Sociological Bulletin, and wrote prolifically on a wide range of sociological topics.

He successfully implemented two key features in his department: combining teaching and research and merging sociology and social anthropology.

Ghurye is best known for his writings on caste and race, but also wrote on tribes, kinship, family, marriage, culture, civilisation, cities, religion, and sociology of conflict and integration.

His intellectual influences included diffusionism, Orientalist scholarship on Hindu religion, nationalism, and cultural aspects of Hindu identity.

A major focus of Ghurye’s work was tribal or aboriginal cultures, gaining attention through his debate with Verrier Elwin.

In the 1930s and 1940s, debates emerged on the place of tribal societies in India and the state’s role in relation to them.

British administrator-anthropologists viewed tribals as primitive, distinct cultures vulnerable to exploitation and cultural degradation, advocating state protection to preserve tribal life.

Nationalist Indians, including Ghurye, believed in unity and modernization of Indian society, viewing efforts to preserve tribal culture as keeping them backward.

Ghurye characterized Indian tribes as ‘backward Hindus’, showing they had long-standing interactions with Hinduism and were part of the broader process of cultural assimilation.

The debate was not about the interaction with mainstream culture, but the evaluation of its impact:

• Protectionists feared exploitation and cultural extinction.

• Ghurye and nationalists argued these were common difficulties faced by all backward and downtrodden sections of Indian society, seen as inevitable in development.