This book is about various perspectives which help us understand Indian society, which has passed through a long evolutionary process beginning from monarchy to feudalism, colonialism and democracy. Officially, it is now a plural, democratic, technological, industrial and capitalistic society. Indian sociological thinkers, such as D.D. Kosambi, Romila Thapar, Radhakamal Mukerjee, G.S. Ghurye, M.N. Srinivas, S.C. Dube, D.P. Mukerji, A.R. Desai, Ramkrishna Mukherjee, Yogendra Singh, N.K. Bose, Surajit Sinha, B.R. Ambedkar and Ranajit Guha, and a few western sociologists, including Louis Dumont, McKim Marriot and David Hardiman, who have done research in India and also developed their own perspectives on Indian society, are discussed in it. In a nutshell, the main perspectives that this book discusses are historical, indological, structural-functional, dialectical-historical, cultural, civilizational and subaltern. This edition has been throughly updated and revised to include extended discussions on Irawati Karve and André Béteille in indological and social stratification perspectives, respectively. The book will be useful for students, teachers and researchers alike.