Breaking down the question
The question has two distinct parts, and both are marked. The first is a definition task — define ethnicity — which requires a precise conceptual statement, ideally showing awareness that ethnicity is not a natural given but a socially constructed and often politically mobilised identity. The second is a discussion task — the factors responsible for the growth of ethnic movements in India — which asks for a developed, illustrated analysis of causes.
The examiner is testing whether the candidate can move from concept to context: from a general definition of ethnicity to the specific conditions in India that have turned ethnic identity into collective mobilisation. A strong answer keeps the definition analytically alive throughout, using it to explain why ethnicity becomes a basis for movements.
The analytical core is the theory of ethnic mobilisation — that ethnic identity is activated and made politically salient by particular economic, political, and cultural conditions, rather than expressing a primordial essence.
How to approach it
Answer the two parts in order. First, define ethnicity carefully: a sense of collective identity based on shared descent, language, religion, region, or culture, that marks a group off from others. Note the distinction between the primordialist view — ethnicity as given and deep-rooted — and the constructivist or instrumentalist view associated with Fredrik Barth and Paul Brass, which sees ethnic boundaries as maintained and mobilised in specific situations, often by elites.
Then discuss the factors behind ethnic movements in India, organised into clear categories: uneven development and relative deprivation; competition over resources and jobs ("sons of the soil"); the politics of language and religion; identity assertion and cultural preservation, especially among tribes; and the role of political elites in mobilising ethnic sentiment for advantage. The note on ethnicity and identity movements develops these strands and their Indian illustrations.
Conclude by drawing the two parts together: because ethnicity is constructed and mobilisable, movements grow when deprivation, competition, and elite entrepreneurship activate latent identities.
Model answer
Defining ethnicity. Ethnicity refers to a sense of collective identity held by a group that sees itself, and is seen by others, as distinct on the basis of shared attributes — common descent or ancestry, language, religion, region, custom, or a shared history. An ethnic group is thus a community bound by a belief in common origin and a distinctive culture, marked off from other such groups by a recognised social boundary.
Two views of ethnicity contend in sociology. The primordialist view treats ethnic identity as deep-rooted, ascriptive, and given at birth. The more persuasive constructivist and instrumentalist view, associated with Fredrik Barth, locates ethnicity not in the cultural content of a group but in the boundary that separates it from others — a boundary that is maintained, and can be activated, in social interaction. Paul Brass, writing on India, argues that ethnic identities are frequently constructed and mobilised by elites who find political or economic advantage in doing so. On this understanding ethnicity is not a fixed essence but a socially produced identity whose salience rises and falls with circumstances — which is precisely why it can become the basis of movements.
Factors responsible for the growth of ethnic movements in India. India's extraordinary diversity of language, religion, tribe, and region provides the raw material of ethnic identity, but diversity alone does not produce movements. Several factors turn latent identity into active mobilisation.
Uneven development and relative deprivation. Regionally unequal development leaves some communities feeling economically marginalised relative to others. The perception that one's group is being denied its fair share — of investment, jobs, or political power — generates the sense of deprivation that fuels ethnic assertion, as in the demands of several north-eastern and tribal regions.
Competition over resources and the "sons of the soil" sentiment. Migration and labour-market competition provoke movements in which locals assert a prior claim to jobs, land, and opportunities against "outsiders". Such nativist mobilisation, defending the sons of the soil, has recurred in several Indian states experiencing in-migration.
The politics of language. Language has been among the most potent bases of ethnic mobilisation in India — from the movements that produced linguistic reorganisation of states to continuing assertions of linguistic identity. Language fuses cultural pride with claims to administrative and economic advantage.
Religion and cultural identity. Religious identity, and the defence or assertion of cultural distinctiveness, has mobilised communities where faith becomes the marker of the group boundary, sometimes hardening into communal conflict.
Tribal identity and the threat to autonomy. Among Adivasi communities, movements have grown from the threat that development, displacement, and the incursion of outsiders pose to land, resources, and cultural survival, generating demands for autonomy, statehood, or protection.
Elite mobilisation and the political process. Following Brass, ethnic movements grow because political elites and organisations mobilise identity for electoral and material advantage, converting cultural difference into political demand. Competitive democratic politics rewards leaders who can activate an ethnic vote, so the political process itself incubates ethnic movements.
Conclusion. Because ethnicity is a constructed and mobilisable identity rather than a primordial essence, ethnic movements in India grow when structural conditions — uneven development, resource competition, and cultural threat — combine with the entrepreneurship of elites who activate group boundaries for advantage. The diversity of Indian society supplies the potential; deprivation, competition, and mobilisation convert it into movement. Managing this requires not the suppression of identity but the redress of the inequalities and insecurities that make ethnic assertion attractive.
Examiner's perspective
The two-part structure must be honoured. Candidates who rush the definition to reach the "discussion" lose easy marks; those who define ethnicity precisely — and, better still, flag the primordialist-constructivist distinction — establish command from the outset. The definition should then do work in the answer, explaining why ethnicity is mobilisable.
In the second part, examiners reward organisation into clear factors — deprivation, competition, language, religion, tribal identity, elite mobilisation — each illustrated from the Indian context. Naming Barth for the boundary theory and Brass for elite mobilisation signals theoretical depth and lifts the script above a descriptive list.
The strongest answers connect the two parts: because ethnicity is constructed and activated rather than given, movements arise where specific conditions and actors bring identity to political life. That analytical thread — from concept to cause — is what distinguishes a first-class response from an adequate one.