Vol. 1, Issue 13, Part H (2015)

Abstract
No aspect of Indian history has aroused more controversy than India’s history of social relations. All nations have divisive elements. They can be ethnic, religious, linguistic regional or caste-based. In some societies caste-like divisions are relatively simple. But nowhere the social divisions were made perpetually relevant by cleverly being crafted into the religious scriptures and nowhere were these divisions so intricately mixed with the concept of purity and pollution thereby condemning a section of the population into degraded existence for thousands of years. While many societies got over these unequal social divisions over long periods of their existence, the continuation of the Indian cultural traditions all through the last four to five thousands of years, has not only baffled many observers, it has also forced them to view the caste system as an integral part of the Indian culture.rnThe present paper tries to explore the possibility of looking into the causes of Indian defeat in the pre-modern wars and to analyse if unequal social divisions (caste system) contributed in any way to the defeat of the Indian armies in these wars. Despite having developed sound basis of warfare, Indians suffered defeat at the hands of foreign invaders, repeatedly. Indians failed to learn anything from their failures in the battle-field and therefore, had to suffer defeat again and again. It should also be taken into account that invaders managed to snatch victories with relatively very small armies when compared with the vast Indian armies they were pitied with. The invaders greatly influenced the system of warfare as they managed to rule over large territories. Hence one is compelled to validate the fact that socio-cultural factors were definitely at play in influencing results of many Indian wars throughout its long history.