User:Ray saumyajit

Vaidyas

Vaidyas are a Brahminical caste found only in Bengal, India. Vaidya, in Sanskrit, means "the scholarly one". Like Brahmins, who enjoy ritual supremacy in Hindoo society, Vaidyas have the right to the sacred thread and access to the Scriptures. Unlike Brahmins, however, Vaidyas do not conduct Divine Service. At one point of time in history, Vaidyas started practicing medicine. To learn more about the human anatomy, they had to deal with human corpses. And, since they touched the dead, they lost their ritual purity and, along with it, their right to conduct Divine Service. There are more professors and bureaucrats than landowners among Vaidyas. Nobel Laureate Prof. Amartya Sen is the most famous Vaidya of the twentieth century.