Anthropological Survey of India

"What is now required is a carefully and scientifically edited Dictionary or Gazetteer of the Castes, and Tribes, and social distinctions of British India... The English Government has steadily ignored Caste, as far as the administration of public affairs is concerned... I am glad to hear that there is a prospect of an Ethnological Survey of British India."

"Intensive studies of individual tribes are very important and I think ASI (ie. the Anthropological Survey of India) will always help scholars studying tribal society in different parts of the country. We should not leave the study of Nadars of Tamil Nadu or Patidars of Gujarat to foreign scholars. We should study them ourselves. This is very very necessary particularly because their intellectual and political perspectives are different from our own."