Knitting together India’s many political subcultures, represented as castes, is key to democratic success. Caste is the unspeakable reality that also happens to be the great unavoidable in the Indian electoral scene. Early in his campaign, Prime Minister Narendra Modi called for the ostracism of everybody who talked caste. The government existed to serve all, “irrespective of caste, creed and other factors”, he pronounced while laying the foundation stone for a memorial at the birthplace of Ravidas, medieval poet-saint and icon of Dalit identity.