In comparison to India, the caste system in Sri Lanka is considered to be mild. Three parallel and more or less independent caste systems prevail in Sri Lanka: Sinhala, Sri Lanka Tamil and Indian Tamil. Each caste system involves some forms of caste-based discrimination. The academic research on caste was popular in the 1950s and 1960s. Most of these studies focused on functions of caste within a system of organic solidarity to the neglect of any consideration of caste discrimination and the plight of the bottom layers in the society.