A main characteristic of rural caste is the coming together or various caste-sections living in a village in order to produce food and goods and services needed locally. In other words, caste system at the village level is locked into production system and vice versa. Thus the household of a landowner has enduring symbiotic relations with particular households of blacksmith, carpenter, potter, oilman, barber, washerman, priest and tenants or labourers. The symbol of the this is what is called the jajmani system in which specified quantities of grain-with-straw are paid by the landowner after harvest to the heads of the artisan, labouring and servicing households who have worked for him during the previous agricultural year. Traditionally, the rates remained stable over long stretches of time, and a landowner was expected to keep his workers so long as they did not persistently default on their tasks, and in turn the workers could not change their masters without serious reason, lndeed, patron-client and master-servant relationships tended to be hereditary, a land-owner inheriting, as it were, a body of specialists to work on his land just as the latter inherited him. Inter-caste and interfamilial relations in the village were enduring and multi stranded.
Who among the following groups has enduring relationships with the service providers like blacksmith, potter, barbers etc?
Correct Answer: (a) Landowners
Solution:According to the above passage, the landowner group has established long term relationship with service providers like blacksmith, carpenter, potter, barber etc.