Dalits - Real Issues & Discussion

dhu · (This post was last modified: 03-21-2006, 07:19 PM by dhu.)

An important post from the new HC list:

QUOTEFrom: "neelakandanaravindan" <neelakandanaravindan@...>
Date: Mon Mar 20, 2006Â 10:51 am
Subject: Caste-Colonialism-Capital and Dalits of Christian Germany Witzelian FatherlandÂ

Often Hinduism is criticized for its so-called rigid social stratification. The 'Caste' system has often been called the bane of Hindu society and some critics have gone to the extent of stating that this is the defining feature of Hinduism setting it apart from 'egalitarian' traditions like Christianity and Islam. Such critics of Hinduism also quote various Smrithis including Manu Smrithi. However, such social-stratification with divine sanction can be seen everywhere. In Europe as well as in Islamic countries such birth-based social stratification with demeaning position for certain manual professions have existed and they have been justified with divine sanctions. Then how come today rigid 'caste' structure exists only in India. Answer lies in colonialism and capital drain. With colonial expansion of Europe, Europeans spread over three continents completely destroying the natives there. In this extermination of races the 'promised land' imagery set the framework for interacting with native cultures. Africa, or America or Australia was envisaged by white settelers as the cannaites and were supposed to be exterminated by the 'divine will'. In association with this there was a tremendous capital creation which ushered in indutrial revolution and capitalism. All these helped Europe affordable to shift from birth-based divinely sanctioned social stratification to a class structured society. Nevertheless vestiges remain. But in the case of India, there was considerable capital drain during the corresponding period coupled with a colonial administration seeking to freeze the social stratification limiting all social mobility vertically and horizontally. Yet it is to the credit of Hindu nationalism that soical stratification has been challenged even amidst capital drain which tends to make the society rigid and hinder social changes. Varna is altogether different and can be seen as theoretical view of the functioning of society whether is caste based or class based.

This is my view of why the so-called caste still remains in India. i feel further convincedÂ of this thesis with the publication of the following important book that deals with -Dalits in the Christian Germany of Michael Witzel's ancestors- :
"Defiled Trades and Social Outcasts Honor and Ritual Pollution in Early Modern Germany"( Series: Cambridge Studies in Early Modern History) author: Kathy Stuart published by University of California, Davis.

This book presents a social and cultural history of Ã¢â¬Ëdishonourable peopleÃ¢â¬â¢ (unehrliche Leute), an outcast group in early modern Germany. Executioners, skinners, grave-diggers, shepherds, barber- surgeons, millers, linen-weavers, sow-gelders, latrine-cleaners, and bailiffs were among the Ã¢â¬ËdishonourableÃ¢â¬â¢ by virtue of their trades. This dishonour was either hereditary, often through several generations, or it arose from ritual pollution whereby honourable citizens could become dishonourable by coming into casual contact with members of the outcast group. The dishonourable milieu of the city of Augsburg from the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries is reconstructed to show the extent to which dishonour determined the life-chances and self-identity of dishonourable people. The book then investigates how honourable estates interacted with dishonourable people, and how the pollution anxieties of early modern Germans structured social and political relations within honourable society.

URL: http://www.cambridge.org/uk/catalogue/cata...isbn=0521027217

i request Sri Kalyanji to make sure Ms.Sandhya Jain gets this important publication. Its publication is due this March.

S.an

03-21-2006, 10:01 PM

QUOTEVHP rejects `varnashrama', seeks end to untouchability 
Staff Reporter
"It has no sanction in the Vedas and dharma sasthras" 
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Alien aggressions could have led to practice of untouchabilityÂ Heads of mutts asked to give `manthra deeksha' to all State urged to withdraw cases against Kanchi Sankaracharya 
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Erode: The fifth State Hindu Resurgence Conference organised by the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) and the Grama Koil Poojarigal Peravai has rejected `varnashrama' and sought an end to the practice of untouchability.
Addressing the conference at the CNC College grounds on Sunday, VHP international president Ashok Singhal said untouchability had no sanction in the Vedas and dharma sasthras. Ancient history and mythology had no record on it. Alien aggressions could have led to the practice. He called upon the heads of mutts to give `manthra deeksha' to all without discrimination.

Mr. Singhal said the VHP was outrightly rejecting `varnashrama dharma,' supposedly written in Manusmrithi, in the interest of consolidating Hindu unity to fight conversions and "Jehadi" terror.
Pension for poojaris 
Expressing concern over the living conditions of grama temple poojaris, a resolution passed urged the State to give them Rs.1,000 a month. The families should continue to receive it after the poojaris' death. It sought free power supply to rural temples. The State government should ensure financial assistance for temple festivals and at least one pooja.

The resolution included a `Hindu Agenda' in the form of an appeal to political parties. It sought exemption for temple land from all land reforms legislation, a statutory autonomous board and a State dharmic council for "better" administration of temples.

It sought a ban on conversions and cow slaughter and decried demands for reservation to minorities.

It sought an end to discrimination on legal and constitutional lines in favour of minority institutions.

It urged the Centre to facilitate reconstruction of the Ram temple at Ayodhya and the State to withdraw all cases against Kanchi Sankaracharya.

Hindu population
Expressing concern at the "declining Hindu population, which was growing at 22 per cent as against the growth of minority population at 35 per cent," it urged the Centre to bring in a uniform civil code by implementing the directive principle under Article 44.

A resolution urged the Hindu vote bank to exercise their vote in favour of any party or alliance that pledges to protect their interests in the election manifesto.

www.hindu.com/2006/03/20/...330400.htm

03-21-2006, 10:25 PM

QUOTEOne-day Consultation on
Addressing Social Equity in Achieving MDGs

OneWorld South Asia initiative on Equity and Social Justice
OneWorld South Asia an international organization recently initiated a programme on
Equity and Social Justice under its Knowledge for Development (K4D)
programme. The K4D attempts to build over number of Communities of Practice (COPs) by facilitating multistakeholders dialogues among key organisations engaged in achieving the MDGs. Integrating knowledge into ongoing development practices, the initiative on Equity and Social Justice is to address all round developmental issues of Dalits, Adiwasis and Minority Communities in a holistic manner and attempts to facilitate sharing and learning among COPs through both online and face-to-face interactions with a view to taking collective action for pro-poor policy changes. The major aims and objectives of this initiatives are to initiate action research for relevant knowledge on discrimination, social exclusion and deprivation of socially marginalized groups; debate focusing on discrimination, social exclusion and human rights of socially marginalized groups; develop partnerships and functional linkages through providing and sharing the knowledge for initiating action on public policies and contribute in transforming egalitarian social order into practice and advocate and campaign for promoting social inclusion, protecting human rights and prosper human development.

In this process we are planning to have a National Consultation on Addressing Social Equity in Achieving MDGs atÂ OneWorld South Asia, C 5, Qutab Institutional Area,Â New DelhiÂ â 110 016 on Wednesday 22 March, 2006.

Background Note for Consultation
Equality and Justice are fundamental principle underlined in the UN Millennium Declaration, where about 190 heads of state and representatives of the Government declared and adopted the time bound goals for combating extreme poverty and hunger. On the basis of the principle, the Declaration further outlines set of inter-connected and mutually reinforcing goals, which include eight broad global agenda of human development popularly known as Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

After 5 years the progress reports on MDGs often looked at national level. But the achievement in MDGs Indictors significantly varies within countries are as stark as the variation or gap between countries. These gaps reflect inequality in opportunity â people held back because of their gender, group identity (race, caste ethnicity and religion etc.). Such inequalities are unjust (HDR 2005).
The MDGs very often conceptualized at national level. But the achievement in MDGs Indictors significantly varies within countries are as stark as the variation or gap between countries. These gaps reflect inequality in opportunity â people held back because of their gender, group identity (race, caste ethnicity and religion etc.). Such inequalities are unjust (HDR 2005).
In order to address these issues and advocate for equity and social justice, we are planning to have one-day National Level Consultation on Addressing Social Equity in Achieving MDGs. This discussion tries to deals in a holistic manner with all round developmental issues of Dalits, Tribes, Women, Disabled, Children and other Minority Communities. The discussion would focus on the issues such as:
ï· Why Equity â for growth, productivity, for religious morality and for social justice (Theoretical framework/evidence to understand importance of equity perspective in development)
ï· Whether there is equity among different social groups with reference to MDGs Indicators and whether progress equally affected or benefited the all section of population groups
ï· Public Policy â constitutional rights and government interventionÂ
ï· Challenges â human rights violation and atrocity on dalits and communal violence
ï· Solutions â right to development, social inclusion and empowerment
Through this and other interventions, we hope to enrich the equity perspective in development and programmes of various stakeholders from different sectors including government, non-government, and public sector. We believe that your presence will provide this critical input into our endeavour.
More about our initiative please visit our website contains rich amount of knowledge base resources and advocacy materials: http://socialjustice.ekduniya.net/
Thanking you and looking forward to your presence and participation.Â Please confirm you participation to s.venkatesan@oneworld.net (mob: 9868464212)

Best regards,
Â
Dr.B.Shadrach
Director

And

S. Venkatesan
Knowledge for Development (Equity and Social Justice)

Â

One-day Consultation on
Addressing Social Equity in Achieving MDGs

Wednesday, March 22
OneWorld South Asia
C-5, Qutab Institutional Area
New Delhi

9:30 a.m. - 10:00 a.m. Registration

10:00 a.m. - 11:00 a.m. Opening Remarks

â Dr. B. Shadrach, Director - Meeting Objective and Brief Introduction

â Address on (equity and development â understanding relationships)

â Address by CSO (social equity â as human rights)

11:00 a.m. - 11:30 a.m. Tea Break

11:30 a.m. - 1:00 p.m. Plenary Discussion â addressing challenges to achieve social equity in MDGs
Tentatively (5 members would be in the plenary)

Social inequality in MDGs:Â unequal progress and persisting social disparity in India, by S. Venkatesan, OWSA

Dalits Satiation in Urban India by Ravi Patel, Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi

Dr. Dileep Kumar, Dalits Women and Human Rights Violation â Grass Root Reality

Open discussion

1:00 p.m. - 2:00 p.m. Lunch Break

2:00 p.m. - 3:30 p.m. Group discussion- Social Equity in Achieving MDGs
Statistics to Solutions
Public action- polices/programme â Role of Civil Societies/ NGOs
Challenges â human rights violation and atrocity on dalits and communal violence
Statistics to Solutions â right to development, social inclusion and empowerment

3:30-4.00 p.m. Tea

4.00-5:00 p.m Presentation / Open discussion

5.00 p.m. Closing Comments
Dr. Nilay Ranjan (OWSA K4D - Education)

One-day Consultation on
Addressing Social Equity in Achieving MDGs

Wednesday, March 22
OneWorld South Asia
C-5, Qutab Institutional Area
New Delhi

ParticipantsÂ Â OrganizationÂ Â Â Address
Â
1. Antony ArulrajÂ CBCI CentreÂ Â Â New Delhi

2. Ramit BasuÂ Â National Social Watch CoalitionÂ New Delhi

4. Rati SinghÂ Â AbhyudayaÂ Â Â New Delhi

5. E.ANBANÂ Â BLIAÂ Â Â Chennai

6. VT RajshekarÂ Dalit VoiceÂ Â Â Bangalore

7. Dr. UmakantÂ HCDHRÂ Â Â New Delhi

8. Dr. Dillip KumarÂ ISIÂ Â Â New Delhi

9. KadirvellanÂ Â Peoples WatchÂ Â Â Madurai

10. VimalanathanÂ NESAÂ Â Â Bangalroe

11. Babu Lal SharmaÂ Â Gandhi Peace FoundationÂ Â New Delhi

12. Prof. R.P NathÂ IARASJÂ Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Aurangabad

13. Dr Priyadarshini Vijaisri
Center for the Study of Developing Societies,Â Â New Delhi

14. Ravindra R. PatilÂ Jamia MilliaÂ Â Â New Delhi

15. Shantanu DuttaÂ EHAÂ Â Â New Delhi

16. MoosaÂ On Dalit issues from Eastern U.P.

17. Mehar Chand on HealthÂ from Western U.P.

18. Ramesh Shukla on Adivasis and Land Rights from Bundelkhand

19. Tanveer from Central U.P.

20. Utkarsh Sinha on Farmers and Agriculture from Tarai

21. Rajendra on Land reforms and land rights from Kaimoor Region

22. Dr. Dillip Kumar, ISI, New Delhi

23. B Mani,Â REED Trust, Nagapattinam

24. Dinesh Suna, Policy Officer, CASA

25. J. Vijay, Cooperative Outreach of India, New Delhi

26. Monica Raina, Solution Exchange, NUDP, New Delhi

27. M Mahamallik, IIDS, New Delhi

28. R.ARUL, PASUMAI THAAYAGAM (Green Mother Land), CHENNAI

30. Rajni Tilak, NACDOR, New Delhi

31. Santhos Samle, Dalit Foundation, New Delhi

32. Dr. M.P. Rane, BSS India, New Delhi.

33. Prof. Sushma Yadev, IIPA, New Delhi.

34. Dinesh Agrawal, NTPC, New Delhi

35. NTPC, New Delhi.

36. Ratna M Sudarshan, ISST, New Delhi

37. Dr.Belinda Bennet Christian Aid, New Delhi

38. B. Muralidaran, Oxfam New Delhi

39. Vineeth Kumar, New Delhi

03-23-2006, 02:17 AM

xpost from Dravidianist movement thread..

QUOTE(Bharatvarsh @ Mar 22 2006, 10:52 AM)<div class='quotetop'>QUOTEThe boy who gives a truer picture of 'Periyar'
V SUNDARAM

I recently interviewed M Venkatesan, a 'Dalit', whose family has been living in a slum area called Hanumanthapuram in Triplicane during the last 25 years. I am specifically mentioning the fact that he belongs to the Dalit community only to take the wind from the sails of self-styled, castiest and communalist Dravidian leaders who often pride themselves as saviours, champions, protectors and upholders of the backward and suppressed communities in Tamilnadu under the political umbrella of 'self-respect' and 'social justice'. Venkatesan is a bright, hardworking and precocious young man who has taken his MA in Philosophy from Vivekananda College, Chennai. He told me that when he joined the Vivekananda College, he had to face a barrage of difficult and unanswerable questions from his fellow students on the so-called 'revolutionary and unprecedented' contribution of 'Periyar E V Ramasamy Naicker' to the emancipation and liberation of the oppressed and suppressed communities in Tamilnadu. Finding himself in a state of siege, Venkatesan, being a Dalit himself, took the initiative of researching into almost all the publications brought out by 'Periyar Suyamariyadai Prachara Nilayam' and also into the writings of Periyar's contemporaries like Annadurai, M P Sivagnanam, comrade Jeevanandam, KAP Viswanathan, etc. Not being totally satisfied he went through all the magazines and journals like 'Viduthalai', 'Kudiyarasu', 'Dravida Naadu', 'Dravidan' etc, relating to the period during which Periyar lived in order to ascertain the truth and also to get hold of solid and irrefutable facts.

As a great believer in Hinduism and Hindu philosophy, his sensitive soul was tortured by the baseless attacks of Periyar on Hindu Gods and Goddesses. I would like to quote his own words in this context: 'I could not help viewing Periyar's uncivilised and barbarous attacks upon my chosen Gods and Goddesses and my own Hindu faith as wanton attacks on my dear and sacred mother who begot me. My search into the works of Periyar and my extensive reading of all his articles gave a rude cultural shock to me. I was greatly dismayed by the hellish hatred of Periyar towards my faith and towards my chosen Gods and Goddesses'.

Hatred of Brahmins and hatred of Hindu Gods, these according to Venkatesan were the only pith and pin of Periyar's public life.
According to Venkatesan, Periyar was a man of virulent contradictions, inexplicable incongruities and inchoate insensitivities. As he very much wanted these facts to be made known to the public he has written a book in Tamil entitled 'E V Ramasamy Naickarin Marupakkam' (The other side of E V Ramasamy Naickar).

During the course of my interview, he told me with an anguished feeling that if only people cared to read my book on 'E V Ramasamy Naickar', then they will clearly understand how some sections of people in Tamilnadu, behaving like heads of cattle, were brainwashed into the hero-worship of E V Ramasamy Naickar, completely ignoring the inherent and fundamental contradictions in his self-proclaimed ideologies founded only on communal hatred of Brahmins and atheistic hatred of Hindu Gods. Venkatesan's view is that Periyar wrongly thought that when he attacked Brahmins, he was attacking Hinduism and when he attacked Hinduism, he was attacking Brahmins. At the same time, the comedy is that Periyar had very warm feelings towards the Gods of Islam and Christianity. 'I am really ashamed of those people who have veneration for E V Ramasamy Naickar and his perverse philosophy of selective hatred of men and things. I am no less rational or serious than him when I say this', observed Venkatesan.

Venkatesan emphatically declared that Periyar did nothing for the emancipation of the oppressed and suppressed dalits. On the contrary he was inimical towards all the dalits whom he treated with utmost contempt. His contempt for the dalits (90 per cent) was only exceeded by his hatred for the Brahmins (100 per cent). To quote from Venkatesan's book: Periyar said: 'The attempt to promote 'temple entry' and 'abolition of untouchability' by the Congress leaders should not result in the tragedy of people belonging to the backward classes getting reduced to the level of scheduled castes. Instead of attempting to raise the status of Scheduled Castes (Parayans), an attempt should not be made to reduce the status of backward Class (Sudrans) by relegating them to the levels of Scheduled Castes. On no account should the existing status of Sudrans be reduced to the level of Parayans'. Venkatesan says in his book that Periyar's contempt if not hatred for the dalits was shown in another context by his flash
observation: 'One of the main reasons why there is an upward trend in the prices of clothes and textiles is that women belonging to the Scheduled Castes (Parachies) have started wearing blouses these days. The reason for growing unemployment in society is on account of increasing number of people belonging to Scheduled Castes (Parayans) taking to school education and higher education'. Venkatesan concludes that Periyar was a sworn enemy of dalits, their education, emancipation, growth and development. 'As a dalit I have come to this definite conclusion based upon Periyar's golden thoughts, observations and averments on my dalit community', says Venkatesan.

Even a cursory reading of Venkatesan's book will show how Periyar, who was always concerned with the self-respect of the Dravidian race, and more particularly the Tamil race, upheld the glory, the greatness and the grandeur of the Tamil language for over 70 years through his historic and time-defying observations and writings which will ring across centuries. Here are a few pearls from 'Periyarana' cited by Venkatesan in his book:

'For more than 40 years, I have been describing Tamil as a barbarous language (Kattumirandi Mozhi) used only by barbarians. When Brahmins and the Brahmin-dominated government wanted to make Hindi a State language, I started, to a very limited extent, advocating the promotion of Tamil language only to oppose the imposition of Hindi language. The only language that ought to replace Tamil is English. What is not there in English which can be found in Tamil Language?'

Periyar's patriotism and love for our nation are brought out in his own statement: 'Though I might have blocked the exit of the Englishmen from India, though I might have betrayed in a treasonable manner the cause of India's freedom, I have not been a party to the installation of sinners from the Brahmin community with its fall out effects of domination of people from Northern India backed by the lust for money power, paraphernalia of public offices and self-interest'.

I have quoted only very very sparingly from the book authoured by Venkatesan. In order to fully understand the truth-defying greatness of 'Periyar' and Periyarism in proper perspective, one has to read this book from end to end with great care and caution, inspired by the shadow ideals of 'self-respect' and 'rationalism'.

I view Venkatesan as a symbol of a new awakening among the youth in Tamilnadu. I am quite impressed by his zest for learning, thoroughness in his approach to academic research and above all his fearless gentlemanliness deriving its unassailable strength from his passion for truth and justice. Venkatesan lamented: 'The trouble with Tamilnadu is that prejudice often scores a victory over principle. Prejudice, which sees what it pleases, cannot see what is plain. I only wanted to pursue plain truth and nothing else'.

http://www.newstodaynet.com/2006sud/06mar/0803ss1.htm
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03-26-2006, 10:58 PM

QUOTEPOLITICS OF DALITISM: creating Dalits among Dalits

By R.Upadhyay
http://www.saag.org/papers4/paper331.html

The attempt of some of activists of Dalit movement in India to internationalise the issue in World Conference Against Racism (WCAR) concluded in the first week of September and follow up actions have created an impression that there is something basically wrong in the ideological orientation of the movement.Â The word Dalit was coined in post-colonial India by the disciples of Ambedkar.Â They did not accept the word Harijan (Men of God) used by Gandhi for the untouchables in Hindu social order because of their aversion against him.Â The word Dalit therefore, became the vernacular terminology for the oppressed classes, with a wider connotation for electoral sociology in the democratic polity of the country.Â Â

Mahatma Gandhi & Dr. Ambedkar: If we look to the history of Dalit movement, it is as old as the birth of the concept of untouchability, which was the darkest spot in Hindu social structure.Â Though, Hindu reformists tried their best to fight against this social evil right from the days untouchability was born, the real concern over it came to surface during the freedom struggle, when Mahatma Gandhi and Dr. B.R.Ambedkar fought against it in their own way.Â While Gandhi wanted complete eradication of untouchability for emotional integration of Hindu society, Ambedkar was for abolition of Varnashram structure of the Hindu social order.Â Â

The conceptual difference between the two messiahs of untouchables continues to affect the Dalit movement even after their death.Â While the disciples rejected Mahatma Gandhi for the sake of power and fulfillment of their personal ambitions, Ambedkar became a symbol of Dalit movement.Â A clue to understanding Ambedkar lies in his hatred of Gandhi.Â The activists of Dalit movement adopted the same philosophy against the upper castes and are still found boiling in the anger generated by their messiah Ambedkar.Â Taking advantage of the violent landscape, which started emerging since the closing decades of twentieth century, the followers of Ambedkar adopted the sole agenda to create social disorder and capture power.Â In both the situations, the process of social transformation in Hindu society, which took off in positive direction just after independence got disturbed.Â Â

To understand the multi dimensional direction of the Dalit movement, we may briefly look into the difference between Gandhi and Ambedkar on this issue.Â During the first Round Table Conference, when Ambedkar favoured the move of the British Government to provide separate electorate for the oppressed classes, Gandhi strongly opposed it on the plea that the move would disintegrate the Hindu society.Â He went for an indefinite hunger strike from September 20, 1932 against the decision of the then British Prime Minister J.Ramsay MacDonald granting communal award to the depressed classes in the constitution for governance of British India.Â Â

In view of the mass upsurge generated in the country to save the life of Gandhi, Ambedkar was compelled to soften his stand.Â A compromise between the leaders of caste Hindu and the depressed classes was reached on September 24,1932, popularly known as Poona Pact.Â The resolution announced in a public meeting on September 25 in Bombay confirmed -" henceforth, amongst Hindus no one shall be regarded as an untouchable by reason of his birth and they will have the same rights in all the social institutions as the other Hindus have".Â This landmark resolution in the history of the Dalit movement in India subsequently formed the basis for giving due share to Dalits in the political empowerment of Indian people in a democratic Indian polity.Â Â Â

Even though Ambedkar was a party to Poona Pact, he was never reconciled to it.Â His contempt against Gandhi, which continued even after his assassination on January 30,1948.Â On the death of Gandhi he expressed, "My real enemy has gone, thank goodness the eclipse is over".Â He equated the assassination of Gandhi with that of Caesar and the remark of Cicero to the messenger - "Tell the Romans, your hour of liberty has come".Â He further remarked, "While one regrets the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi, one cannot help finding in his heart the echo of the sentiments expressed by Cicero on the assassination of Caesar".Â Considering Gandhi as a "positive danger to this country", he quoted from Bible that "sometime good cometh out of evil, so also I think good will come out of the death of Mr. Gandhi" ( Gandhi and Ambedkar - Saviours of Untouchables by Sheshrao Chavan.Â Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan publication 2001, page 263-64).Â Â

The reaction of Ambedkar over the death of Gandhi may be viewed as a politics of negation for vengeance against the caste Hindus and also for political power for Dalits.Â He felt, "the problem of depressed classes will never be solved unless they get political power in their own hand" (Thus spoke Ambedkar by Bhagwan Das).Â He however, did not clarify as to how in a democratic polity of pluralistic society, Dalits would be the sole custodians of power.Â Â

Post Ambedkar Dalit Movement:Â The post-Gandhian and post-Ambedkar Dalit activists re-invented the direction of their movement, which was by and large focussed towards developing the negative ideas in a dark room.Â They are yet to take the next step to focus their negatives in light for positive prints.Â In the absence of a scientific endeavour their movement lags in its march towards social reform, as it has more or less become a platform for the political empowerment of some individuals for their personal ambitions and vested interests.Â This is not only against the concept of equalitarian Hindu sociology of Vedic India but also against the concept of democracy.Â Â

The present clash for Dalit leadership has confirmed the theory of C.Rajagopalachari that many Dalit leaders are interested for continuance of the undesirable status of Dalits for the fulfillment of their personal ambitions.Â Disagreeing with Ambedkar on Dalits issue he said, "â¦This is material explanation for the violent dislike of Gandhiji exhibited by Dr. Ambedkar, who looks upon this great and inspired reformer as the enemy of the untouchables, meaning thereby of the educated and ambitious among them who find that the depressed status furnishes short cut to position".( "Ambedkar Refuted"page 33, Hind Kitab Publishers: Bombay 1946)Â

It may be partially true that political empowerment is key to social and economic empowerment as suggested by Ambedkar but this cannot be the sole criteria for the social equality of Dalits.Â The representatives (122 -76 SC and 46 ST in parliament against its strength of 543 and 1085 -556 SC and 529 ST in state assemblies against their strength of 4370) of Dalits in parliament and state assemblies in sizeable strength have been sharing political power for last fifty years.Â But if they have failed to bring a desired social change and economic upliftment of Dalits, there is something wrong in the movement, which is yet to be identified.Â The students of the constituting history have therefore, a right to know from Dalit activists the reason behind the failure of their representatives sharing political power.Â

One may be amused to understand that how only160 Dalit delegates under the umbrella of National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights in WCAR would have fought for the cause of Dalits in India if the representatives of Dalits sharing political power could not assert and agitate for the cause of their community? An objective analysis of the prevailing social condition and sentiments in India may corroborate the theory of C.Rajagopalachari that Dalit movement has become a vehicle to promote the personal interest of some individuals or groups.Â

The Dalits despite empowerment are not a political force â why?:Â In the absence of an All India mind with a cohesive and unified perspective, Dalit movement has also failed to emerge as a strong political force.Â Dalits are divided into hundreds of castes and sub-castes.Â About 56 percent of Dalit population belong to about 20 dominant castes among them.Â These dominant castes are presently grabbing all the privileges provided to the Dalits constitutionally.Â Even Dr.Ambedkar failed to give an intellectual explanation to unify them together, as a result, his political influence during his life time also remained confined to only Mahar caste of his community in the Maharashtra region.Â

Dalit activists, due to lack of actual ideological direction are not clear whether they are interested to ensure the material prosperity of Dalits or equal status in Hindu social order.Â Untouchability has almost disappeared, as touch of Dalit is no more considered to have any polluting affect on caste Hindus.Â However, so long the Dalits enjoy the benefits of reservation in Government jobs and admission in academic institutions, they may have to bear the stigma of being considered unequal in merit to the caste Hindus.Â The objective of Dalit movements should be therefore, to erase such stigma, which is possible only if Dalits get a chance for their proper education befitting to the standard required for competitions.Â Â

Vested interests in Command:Â Contrary to the objective of the movement discussed above, the managers of Dalit movement due to their vested interest do not want their people to be cleansed from the stigma of reservation and the agony of their past humiliation of being treated as untouchables.Â In stead of fighting for transformation of the Hindu social order, they are found more interested to promote themselves as Esperanto of United Nations politics.Â Â With weapon of hate, they are neither able to fight against the social inequality and injustice effectively nor in a position to contribute any significant social change.Â Â

In stead of looking on the growing consciousness among the educated caste Hindus against the social evil of caste discrimination against Dalits and appreciating this positive change, the Dalit activists ignore and understate the development.Â Their sole aim is now pointed towards personal ambitions at the cost of their community.Â This has created a new class of Brahmins among the Dalits, who are now exploiting the actual Dalits by grabbing the benefits meant for the latter.Â This may look like a paradox, but it is the hard reality.Â

The on going Dalit movement is gradually losing its track.Â Its multi-dimensional character based on the philosophy of love and hate is unfortunately turned into political theocracy, which is contrary to the basic concept of the total transformation of Hindu social order.Â Inciting the Dalits against the caste Hindus for historical agony without any honest effort for their emotional integration with rest of the Hindu social order is neither in the interest of this disadvantaged section of population nor in the interest of the nation.Â

The shrinking influence of the so called Brahminsm in electoral politics, social transformation, spiritual movement, or even other public affairs are enough indications of gradual changes in Hindu sociology.Â Dalit movements with a view to create social disorder by promoting caste hatred against the upper castes of ancient Varnashram system will simply halt the process of the on going social transformation.Â With their political empowerment by occupying the post of President, Union Cabinet ministers, Chief ministers, and bureaucrats, Dalits are gradually getting more opportunities for achieving social empowerment under democratic process.Â By gaining more confidence, Dalits are now found to be quite assertive of their rights.Â This however, does not mean that they have been acceptable in community dining or inter-caste marriage, which is not even prevalent within the various Dalit castes.Â Â

The objective of any social reform movement is to ensure a peaceful, decent and dignified life for every body without any social confrontation.Â But, unfortunately the Dalit activists are so obsessed and possessive in their approach towards the historical agony of their community that they have made the latter as prisoners of Dalitism, which hardly has any constructive plan for creation of a just social order.Â Their slogan for abolition of Varnashram (professional units) system and total abolition of caste is an utopian concept, which will never take root in the diverse and pluralistic Indian society.Â

Casteism is the bane of Indian society but the Indian people accept caste as a hard reality.Â Even the Christians and Muslims boast themselves of their upper caste heritage.Â In South India even Christians are maintaining visible distance from the Dalit Chritians as the latter continue to have separate church, separate burial ground and even separate places for social interactions.Â Similarly, even Muslims in India and Pakistan there is no inter- caste marriage among the Sheiks, Syed, Paithan and others because of their upper caste heritage before conversion.Â

The three Dalits groups and their separate agenda:Â As far as the present Dalit movement is concerned, it is in the hands of three vested interest groups of Dalit politicians, Dalt writers and Chrisian missionaries.Â Dalit political leaders like Kansi Ram and Ms Mayawati of Bahujan Samaj Party and Ram Vilas Paswan of Lok Jana Shakti are having their influence exclusively among the members of their own community.Â They can never come to power on their own due to their limited influence among the voters.Â For coming to power they are compelled to join some other parties dominated by caste Hindus.Â They are therefore, hardly in a position to bring any social change.Â

The second group, which claims to be the champion for the cause of Dalits is of Dalit writers.Â Their personal ambition and ego have kept them away from the common Dalits, who are illiterate and poor.Â They are more interested in their self-promotion than serving the cause of their community.Â Their possessiveness is often mistaken as love for Dalits.Â Since they do not get enough space in media to spit venom against the caste Hindus and are hardly in a position to play an effective role in electoral politics, they are always in search of the forces through which they could get national and international recognition.Â They have therefore, joined hand with forces (third group) determined to disintegrate the Hindu society.Â

The interest of the third group in Dalit movement is to de-Hinduise the Dalits and promote their proselytisational endeavour.Â The argument of this group that Christian society does not have any caste discrimination is not based on ground reality.Â The Dalit Christians are facing the problem of caste discrimination even in Christian society.Â Such discrimination is prevalent in Kerala even after the death of Dalit Christians, whose corpses do not find any place in the cemetery meant for upper caste convert Christians. T.V.Rajshekhar, a Dalit writer, while speaking in a seminar (Church and Dalit) organised by Christian leaders in Madras on June 14, 1986 said that Dalit Christians form about 80 percent Christian population in India but contrary to what Jesus Christ preached, the Dalit Christians are also the victim of caste discrimination as they have separate burial ground, separate churches and separate dwelling places.Â

Ever since the promulgation of presidential order No 19 of 1950 debarring the Dalits of non-Hindu and non-Sikh community to be included in the list of Scheduled castes, the Christian missionaries have been facing difficulty in alluring the Hindu Dalits for their conversion.Â For this they have already launched a movement for constitutional privileges for Dalit Christians.Â If they succeed in alienating the Dalits from Hindu social order, the entire Dalit community will get the benefit of constitutional provisions and it will help them in their mission for proselytisation.Â Â

Indian Social Institute(ISI), a Roman Catholic Mission outfit organised a meeting on "Durban and Dalit Discourse: Post Durban Scenario" on September 20.Â The meeting was organised with a view to forming a "broad alliance of disadvantaged section of society to battle the status quo that would prefer to keep them on the periphery of the country's social structure" (Hindu dated September 24).Â The move of the institute is to internationalise the issue.Â Had it not been so, it should first cleanse the Christian society in Kerala.Â In fact the Christian missionaries are also facing a dilemma of the isolation of Dalits from the affluent sections of the community.Â Dr. Prakash Luis, Executive Director of ISI said, "There is a sense of vertical divide within the community between the socially mobile 'Brahmanical Dalits' and the real Dalits among Dalits".Â

Conclusion: In the backdrop of the dialectics of Dalit movements, it appears that the Dalits have now become the victims of the politics of Dalitism being played by various groups.Â Instead of fighting the evils of caste discrimination in Hindu society, the Dalit movement has given birth to neo Dalitism, which hardly has any difference with the polluted Brahmanism.Â

The movement, which does not have the ingredients to bring about reconciliation among conflicting social groups and fails to accelerate the process of social harmony and human dignity, is bound to lose real direction.Â Dalits should therefore be very careful about the politics of Dalitism being played by vested interests not only at the cost of the disadvantaged community but also at the cost of social harmony, which is more dangerous for the nation.Â

(The analysis in the paper is based on the personal perception of the writer.Â E-mail: ramashray60@yahoo.com)

**acharya** · 03-27-2006, 02:03 AM

There is something called "victim syndrome" that is deep roooted in Christianity. It valorizes martyrs, i.e. those who volunteer to become victims for the service of good against evil. Jesus was the pre-eminent voluntary victim. Most saints ordained by the Vatican in its history were martyrs as their main claim to deserving sainthood. The church maintains a FORMAL database of martyrs organized by year and by country, and this is a celebrated status. There is a whole trackong system worldwide funded to notify of martyrs and church training often encourages its evangelists to put themselves in harms way to become martyrs.

Muslims also adopted this idea and they call such a person "shaheed" or martyr.

But in the Hindu-Buddhist-Jain traditions greatness was not based on being martyrs - Ram, Krishna, Shiva, Goddess, various gurus and saints over centuries, intellectuals like Patanjali, Abhinavagupta, Nagarjuna, etc., each were greats on entirely different criteria than martyrdom. We never extolled victimhood as a way to achieve glory. Sikhs do have a few martyrs who died at the hands of the Mughals.

What effects does the martyrdom archetype and victim syndrome cause in the world?

It encourages jihad as a way to reach paradise, it makes people want to claim victim status quickly to get support. That is why the strategy being taught to dalits and minorities across India is how to become "victims" in order to advance. This is new to most Indian jatis, as they competed in the past and went up/down the socioeconomic strata without any of this victim syndrome. Most medieval kings in India were shudras, and many of India's famous textile, iron/steel, and other manufacturing industries were controlled by jatis which later became classifed by British ethnographers as "victims".

This new menatlity causes conflicts by design.(social engineering) It is about time serious intellectuals problematized the use and abuse of victimhood as strategy to get ahead.

regards,
Rajiv Malhotra

04-11-2006, 08:28 PM

http://www.indianexpress.com/res/web/pIe/f...ontent_id=81036
QUOTE
Seeking 'social justice' through US intervention 
SUDHEENDRA KULKARNIÂ Â Â Â Â
Posted online: Sunday, October 30, 2005 at 0000 hours IST
I consider Babasaheb Ambedkar's address to the Constituent Assembly on November 25, 1949, the day before India gave herself a Republican Constitution, one of the greatest speeches ever made by an Indian.

It contains two cautionary thoughts. Firstly, he exhorted vigilance against internal treachery that could make India lose her hard-won independence again. (Ambedkar was brutally frank in citing cases of collaboration with alien powers in India's history.) Secondly, he warned that India would not become a dynamic nation without political empowerment, social justice and economic progress of the downtrodden.
Â
So far, India's achievement on each of these counts has been non-trivial, although an immense lot still needs to be done. Whatever has been achieved is due to a combination of legally mandated reservations; democracy-induced shift in the social base of political power; declining importance of caste in economic interactions; and heightened social awareness that untouchability is wrong.

However, Ambedkar's two warnings have begun to sound timely. Look at some of the disturbing trends in the debate on reservations in the private sector. I am a strong votary of affirmative action by the private sector â not exclusively through reservations, but with a mix of mandatory and voluntary initiatives to massively expand opportunities for education, skillset development, employment and entrepreneurship to benefit the SCs, STs, OBCs and even the poor among other classes and communities. This has become all the more urgent since government and PSU jobs are shrinking for justifiable reasons of right-sizing and, simultaneously, the private sector is growing rapidly thanks to liberalisation and globalisation. Unfortunately, our political and business establishments have so far refused to debate this matter squarely, focusing not on vote banks but on practical options that can harmonise the ends of both social justice and economic growth.

No less questionable is how some activists are advocating reservations in the private sector by lobbying for foreign interference in India's domestic policy-making. It's doubly dubious because their not-so-hidden aim seems to be to defame Hinduism by misprojecting caste as a human rights issue on global platforms, in order to make a case for mass proselytisation with the active help of foreign evangelical organisations.

Earlier this month, the Dalit Freedom Network (DFN), represented by its president Joseph D'souza, who also heads the All India Christian Council, and social activists Udit Raj and Kancha Ilaiah testified before US lawmakers urging them to intervene to ''end caste and stop atrocities against low caste Indians''. They sought reservations in US enterprises in India (BPO units, etc) as well as in the World Bank, IMF and USAID projects. Their loony logic: ''Indian industry, including the print and electronic media, would have to provide reservation for Dalits, tribals and OBCs if US companies do so.'' (If they had their way, the editorship of this newspaper would be reserved on a rotational basis!) Ilaiah (whose books include Why I am Not a Hindu and Buffalo Nationalism: A Critique of Spiritual Fascism) also favours taking the issue of caste â and private-sector reservations â to EU Parliaments and to all the veto-power nations in the UN.

Our intellectuals and politicians need to debate several serious issues that arise out of DFN's audacious way of securing changes in government policy and religious demography in India through foreign, especially US, intervention.

ONE: Which self-respecting nation would countenance such a move? Can Indian Parliament decree on race relations in America or dictate to Wipro or Infosys on what kind of job quota they should have for African-Americans and Hispanics in their US units?

TWO: Hasn't the world had enough of US interference in others' domestic affairs in the name of ''human rights'' and ''democracy''?

THREE: If Hindu extremists deserve to be slammed (yes, they do) for indulging in hate propaganda against other faiths, can there be a different yardstick for those who equate Hinduism with ''spiritual darkness'' and spread lies abroad such as: ''The clay cup is a symbol of Dalit oppression and throughout India (250 million) Dalits are forced to drink out of clay cups which are then destroyed so that no upper caste customer will ever use it and risk 'contamination by a Dalit's uncleanness'.'' (DFN sells one-dollar-per-clay-cup as an awareness-creation strategy in USA. See DFN's website and links for this and other discoveries.)

FOUR: Doesn't the overtly anti-Hindu â not just anti-Hindutva â propaganda by non-Hindu groups, with a thinly veiled agenda of conversion of Dalits and tribals, harm communal harmony? (Recall last week's violent Muslim-Christian clash in Alexandria, Egypt, on the issue of conversions.)

FIVE: Which community is free of deficiencies within? And whose obligation is it to effect reforms in one's religion â that of its own followers or others?

LASTLY, does religious freedom include freedom to slander or belittle other religions, purportedly in the name of reservations? Let's ponder, honestly.
Write to sudheenkulkarni@expressindia.com

04-12-2006, 06:16 AM

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/artic...485666.cms
QUOTE"There are some 3.5 million Dalits in government jobs, about 125 MPs, and hundreds of MLAs. There are about 68,000 Dalits in Group A services."

He adds: "There has been a Dalit head of state, a Dalit deputy prime minister, two Dalit Lok Sabha Speakers, at least half-a-dozen chief ministers, and hundreds of ministers.

There have been Dalit judges in the higher judiciary, and currently a number of Dalits are serving as vice-chancellors of universities."Â

**acharya** · 04-12-2006, 11:44 AM

Mandal-II: It's the age of pro-reservation bloggersAdd to Clippings
Himanshi Dhawan
[ Tuesday, April 11, 2006 10:30:59 amTIMES NEWS NETWORK ]
RSS Feeds| SMS NEWS to 8888 for latest updates

NEW DELHI: Mandal-I generation fought its battle on the streets. Mandal-II is being waged on personal computers and while anti-reservation fervour is evident, there is a new voice in cyberspace - the war has been joined by pro-reservation blogs which are increasing by the day.

The issue has bloggers delivering emotive arguments - like Vivek K Singh on Sulekha: "We cannot claim to be a developed country if we still have OBC and SC/ST castes that lack equal social status and deprived of social respect."

He argued that "reservation was to give representation to the oppressed and socially weak classes, I support reservation for that reason. It is not a fight one caste vs another caste. Reservation is a temporary solution to embolden India's social commitment. Reservation is help, not a fundamental right."

Chandra Bhan Prasad, who runs the Dalit Shiksha Andolan gives some hard-hitting facts, against the argument that SC/STs have not benefited from reservations so far.

He says, "There are some 3.5 million Dalits in government jobs, about 125 MPs, and hundreds of MLAs. There are about 68,000 Dalits in Group A services."

He adds: "There has been a Dalit head of state, a Dalit deputy prime minister, two Dalit Lok Sabha Speakers, at least half-a-dozen chief ministers, and hundreds of ministers.

There have been Dalit judges in the higher judiciary, and currently a number of Dalits are serving as vice-chancellors of universities." Ironically, there is one half of the world where Dalits are invisible, says Prasad.

"Outside the regime of reservations, say in the private sector, there are hardly any known Dalits in corporate boardrooms, acting in Bollywood, or speculating markets at stock exchanges, to say nothing of a publicly traded Dalit-owned company."

Charlie, who completed his PhD at IIT Kanpur and by his own admission interacted with several "reserved quota" students, says: "I do not forsee any remarkable decline in standards at IITs or IIMs."

Injunjoe on fonzter.com agrees: "Reservations are a must. The only problem is that in many cases, reservations actually don't go to the people for whom they are meant."

04-17-2006, 09:50 PM

http://www.epw.org.in/showArticles.php?roo...9&filetype=html

From Sept 2003 EPW..

QUOTEDalit or Harijan?

Self-Naming by Scheduled Caste Interviewees

The terms harijan and dalit have evolved over the last many decades, with the latter more or less replacing the former in published works of recent years. What do members of the scheduled castes call themselves?
Alan Marriott

The most socially and politically acceptable name for the most disadvantaged members of Indian society has changed over the years. Outcaste and untouchable have become unacceptable (although, sadly, still having some descriptive validity). They were replaced, chronologically, by harijan in the middle of the 20th century and subsequently dalit in last decade or two of the century. These names are closely associated with M K Gandhi and B S Ambedkar, respectively and the shift in the status of the names is linked with changed attitudes in the broader political environment as the relative standing of Gandhi and Ambedkar has altered. However, although these changes in usage have clearly occurred among politically aware commentators it is not so apparent what members of the least privileged social groups in Indian society (officially, and perhaps neutrally identified as scheduled castes) call themselves. This study examines the results of a survey in which interviewees were asked to give the name of their caste.

...................

Dalit is now almost universally preferred among researchers and writers. In the Economic and Political Weekly, for example, there has been a marked increase in the number of papers with dalit in their title from the 1980s. There were just 13 papers between 1981 and 1990 compared with 62 in the following decade â including a veritable rush of 33 papers in 1995-97. Harajan appeared in just two titles â in 1981 and 1986.

...................

While most of the scheduled caste respondents gave their jati, a proportion recorded a generic name, but while harijan (or harizan or some other spelling) was used by 1351 respondents in 18 different states, and a number of respondents used scheduled caste, not one respondent chose dalit. In addition some respondents gave harijan qualified by their jati, e g, harijan parayar in Tamil Nadu

...................

Whatever the reservations about the data the scale of the difference in the use of dalit and harijan suggests that there is a real contrast in the preferred name chosen by external commentators and SC people themselves. Ambedkar may be winning the posthumous rivalry among the scribbling classes but Gandhi remains the dominant opinion-former among the SCs themsleves.

04-17-2006, 10:00 PM

In the California SBE open hearing the FOSAs and the akadummies were insisting that 'dalit' is the right word. What this paper has clearly established is that 'dalit' is a manufactured identity - popular among the akadummies and being thrust onto the harijans although I am not sure why Marriott implies that 'dalit' is an Ambedkar identity. It is not and is just being thrust upon the harijans.

04-18-2006, 10:15 AM

when did dalits first start appearing on the horion??

were they there in vedic days?

04-19-2006, 03:20 AM

QUOTEBANGALORE: Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy on Friday gave away the
Ambedkar Award to Shivamurthy Murugarajendra Swamiji of Chitradurga and seven others for their contribution for the uplift of Dalits, at a function to celebrate the 115th birth anniversary of B.R. Ambedkar.

The swamiji, who is known for having trained and anointed a Dalit as the head of a math, said in his acceptance speech that he had chosen this path because it had been the way of the Buddha, Basavanna and Ambedkar, who "only grew in strength at every adversity and defeat, and went on to inspire a mass movement."

Many people believed and spread the belief that he did it for publicity, and he had been taken to court and harassed for having chosen to work with the Dalits and fight for their rightful place in society.

04-28-2006, 06:53 PM

Interesting discussion on Rajeev S blog:

QUOTEkoenraad elst send the following mail that risa types want answers to
the following. will someone on RISA please post my questions there, too?

begin quote from some risa type
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE

(About the terms "Dalit" "Harijan", "SC", quote Smile

I will answer your question with a question: How many of the major
temples in India that are patronized by caste Hindus have ex-untouchable
priests of any self-designation (Harijan, etc.)? How many Hindu leaders
who are ex-untouchables of any self-designation (Harijan, etc.) are
there who count significant numbers of "touchables" amongst their
followers? How many ex-untouchables of any self-designation (Harijan,
etc.) sit on the governing board of the VHP? How many ex-untouchables
of any self-designation (Harijan, etc.) hold high leadership positions
within the RSS? ...and, while we are at it, why is it that Hindu
ex-untouchables always seem to form separate sects whose membership is
predominantly or exclusively made up of others like themselves rather
than caste Hindus? And if the leaders of such sects desired the
recognition and respect of caste Hindu leaders, what name do you think
they would have to call themselves by, "Dalit" or "Harijan"?


end quote from some risa type

sure enough. as soon as they answer the following:

1. how many major churches in the us that are patronized by whites have
any black priests or leaders?
2. how many christian leaders who are black have significant numbers of
whites among their followers? how about vice versa? how many blacks are
members of cults like pat robertson's, oral roberts', and so forth?
3. how many blacks sit on the governing board of the mormons? of the
vatican? of the catholic church in the us? of the southern baptists? of
the unitarians? of the christian scientists? of the moonies? of the
episcopalians? of the methodists? of the seventh day adventists?
4. how many blacks hold high leadership positions in the salvation army,
which is the closest equivalent to the RSS? how many hispanics do? how
many asians do? same questions for the republican party? the democratic
national council?
5. why is it that blacks always seem to form separate
sects/cults/churches whose membership is predominantly or exclusively
made up of blacks rather than whites? same question for chinese,
koreans, filipinos, hispanics, etc?
6. if the leaders desired the recognition and respect of whites what
name do you think they call themselves by, black, hispanic, korean,
chinese etc or just christian?

talk of people living in glass houses! the christian church is far more
oppressive and discriminatory than any hindu ever was! so is american
society in general.

heal thyself first before pontificating to others!

</div>

A reader response:
QUOTERajeev,

1. Hindus have organised themselves for centuries around a loose
structure of duties that are maintained through descent. Being a priest
may be very prestigious in other faiths but in Hinduism it is an onerous
responsibility. It is not a particularly attractive position that
someone would aspire to. The austerities and discipline required is
beyond the reach of most people

2. Brahmanas are by no means the only priestly jati. In TN there are
many groups of non-brahmin priests - the pandarams (who run temples all
over suoth TN and in Malaysia and Sri Lanka perform vedic rituals but do
not wear a sacred thread. and then there are sivacharis, and several
otrher classes of non-vedic priests officiating at sakthi/amman temples.
sometimes the same temple that has a sivachari performing regular
rituals may invite a brahmin priest once a year for a vedic ritual.

3. In the Jagannath temple at Puri */the brahmin priests are not allowed
inside the garba griha of Sri Jagannatha. /*The privilege is restricted
to the tradtional guardian tribe whose priests are called the /badus/.

4. In TN there are many temples among the smaller 'specialised' shrines
where people of all castes worship. These could be a local deity like
the village protecting Ayyanar or Muniswaran, or Karuppannaswami or many
otehr Ammans. Sri Jayendra Sarasvati has gone out of his way to frequent
these shrines and participate in the local ritual taking prasadam from
the hands of Adi-Dravidar priests.

5. The VHP has gone out of its way to train priests from the tibes and
dalit communities and has the lal langots (red breechcloutwalas) in
twists because of this. Because caste while a minor facet of Hindu
practice is the bedrock upon which Hinduhaters have built their
theories. Take away caste (by no means an easy task) and the entire
rationale for hating Hindus collapses

Of course these crooks will find something new to criticise within Hinduism.

05-19-2006, 11:39 PM

QUOTE(aruni @ May 19 2006, 10:05 AM)No comment
<img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/ROTFL.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='ROTFL.gif' />
<div class='quotetop'>QUOTEDear Prof Kancha,

Â Â Greetings

I am writing this mail to you with great hope.

Sir, it was your book ' Why I am not a Hindu' that i read first when I
joined JNU for MA in August 2001. Since then I have lost my peace of
mind, career of

my parents choiceÂ and have debt of about 30 thousand on my head (due to
short lived venture INSIGHT). So to repay this debt, after my father's
death, I have taken up a job. Still your book never let me to choose
'lucrative' jobs but be satisfied with a job that is part of our movement.

I am not the only one whom you have so 'adversly' affected. Atleast I
know two more cases where students like me 'suffered' because they got
affected by your writings and thoughts.

1. One of my friend was thrown out of CSCS banglore because he wanted to
work on your writings but his teachers thought that you are not a scholar
but mere pamphleteer. But friend of mine is pretty confirmed that you are
scholar of first grade. So now being thrown out of the institue he is
roaming here and there to get admission.

2. Second friend of mine was told by his guide to remove your name from his
English PHD synopsis bibiliography. Again the reason was that this guide of
his considered you a mere pamphleteer. This friend of mine was little smart
as he quietly listened to his guide's diatribe against you and then had
heartly laugh while narrating the story to us. We felt so happy that your
name is terror to Indian Accademia. Still this friend of mine gets
nightmares whether he will be able to get his Phd or not.

Sir, like this you and your writings might have 'badly' affected many of our
youngsters through out the length and breadth of the country. They might
have become restless and eager to fight for our cause, against brahminism,
against caste system with out caring about their lives, families and
careers.

But they cant do much. They might be getting frustrated, sad and dejected.

They are unable to use their full potential, talents and channelise energies
due to lack of any worthy platform, role models, leaders.

Our creativity is yet to be tapped.

In my humble opinion the reason is that

Our intellectualls do tell the path and goal but are not there when
we initiate moving towards that goal.

They tell us to organise but forget to tell how to organise.

They tell us to fight but forget to tell how to fight

So all our youths' time is spent by repeating '"organise & Fight'

The same thing is happening now also. More than month had gone since media
onslaught on our dignity and blackmail of doctors. Yet there is no reply
from our side except chantings of "organise and fight", "organise and
fight".

None of us are able to even resort to our democratic right to protest.

But this time Sir, some of us will not sit quitely.

We are definetly going to organise and fight.

But this time you have to pay the price of making us restless and suffer so
much that we cant even read newspapers and watch TVs these days unlike
millions of our community people doing this daily.

Sir, we want you to be present with us when we start our fight. We want you
to be there with us on streets. We want you to be there in educational
institutations where we will visit and mobilise our students. We want you to
lead us.

*THE SAME IS TRUE FOR ALL OUR OTHER INTELLECTUALS - Prof GOPAL GURU, VTR,
PROF THORAT, DR. VIVEK KUMAR, DR. TULSI RAM, DR RAMAIAH, DR SURYAKANT
WAGHMARE, DR NANDU RAM, DR. WANKHEDE, MUDRARAKSHA, MR RAJENDRA YADAVA, MADAM
THORAT, RUTH MONARMA, BAMA, RAJNI TILAK, CHANDRABHAN PRASAD, AND MANY
OTHERS.*

**

*Then there are many intellectuals like SHARMILA REGE, SUSIE THARU, UMA
CHAKARVARTI, PROF SHIVA SHANKARÂ who are also culprits of creating
restlessness among youths,*

So now you all cannot disown us. There is no other alternative for all of
you except to come with us on streets and lead us.

BECAUSE YOU ALL HAVE MADE YOUNGSTERS RESTLESS, ANGRY AND EAGER TO FIGHT
BACK.

many many regards to all

xxxÂ kumar

JNU


<img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/ROTFL.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='ROTFL.gif' />
[right][snapback]51424[/snapback][/right]
</div>

05-20-2006, 07:18 AM

QUOTEhttp://www.newstodaynet.com/crusade/291102.htm
'CASTE' IN THE SAMEÂ MOULD!
Â Â Â Â
Just sample these familiar insertions in theÂ Sunday matrimonial pages of any
newspaper:

* CSI Nadar ChristianÂ invites alliance...Â
* CSI Adi dravidaÂ wants ...Â
* Roman CatholicÂ wants...except SC/ST..Â
* Protestant PillaiÂ seeks...Â

Welcome to theÂ 'casteless' egalitarian world of Christianity. Or at least,
that is what theÂ board outside Evangelists Inc claims. Then what do the above
advertisements thatÂ routinely appear in very secular newspapers point to?
Well, they reveal whatÂ really one confronts behind the facade, the truth, the
whole truth and nothingÂ but the truth, but unfortunately kept captive by an
army of lies.

Frankly itÂ does not need much effort to nail all these
self-evident bluster regarding 'aÂ casteless' Christianity, nor do they qualify as a
closely held secret. As theyÂ say, everyone knows. But there is certainly a
crying urgency to brush up theÂ facts, for, the key weapon brandished by the
champions of conversions is theÂ 'oppressive caste-system of Hinduism'which is
deemed as justification enough forÂ people to migrate to Christianity. And the
orchestrated indignation andÂ self-righteousness with which these paragons
sermonise from the roof-top makeÂ one almost believe for a moment that they are
right after all. That is the powerÂ of lies, told repeatedly and at high decibel
levels. And couched as it is inÂ holy attire, it would make even Goebbels feel
shy.Â

The singular theme ofÂ all their protests, agitations, memoranda to those in
power and of course allÂ those secular editorials in newspapers is that the
oppressed classes have nowÂ been deprived of their only means of salvation from
the clutches of caste.Â Obviously, those editorial writers do not care to see
what appears in their ownÂ papers as advertisements but their ignorance can be
ignored for there are moreÂ people who read the ads than those reading the
edits, thankfully. And thereforeÂ it is common knowledge that, even in
Christianity, salvation for a Nadar liesÂ only with a Nadar, a Pillai gets
invariably wedded to a Pillai, and DalitsÂ continue to be 'untouched' by the 'Caste
Christians', with the healing touch ofÂ the new order remaining a pipe dream.

All these happen by conscious choice as isÂ evident from the 'detailed'
specifications that prospective brides and groomsÂ take special care to mention.
In fact, with several sects and an equal number ofÂ churches dotting the Christian
landscape, there is also a strong tendency toÂ remain within those folds also.
Thus the system of castes, clans and sub-sectsÂ thrives merrily in the promised
land too. The upper caste converts,Â particularly, tend to carry forward their
erstwhile superior status to their newÂ faith too as a means of justifying
their change of religious loyalties to theirÂ angry Hindu castemen whom they had
deserted. They wouldn't countenance aÂ dilution of their caste status!Â

Of course, diligentÂ conversionists have been quick to point out that
casteism is a legacy ofÂ Hinduism and Christianity cannot be blamed. What an
untenable excuse! Sure, butÂ did they not promise to erase these evils when
swallowing the hungry multitudesÂ into their flock? Again, by saying so, are they not conceding defeat in theirÂ 'fight against casteism'? Or was it that the fight
was never intended to beÂ fought in the first place and was just a lure to
attract those in anger andÂ distress? We all know, and make no mistake, they all
know too. It is just thatÂ these torch bearers of the 'true faith' somehow feel
most comfortable riding onÂ falsehood to reach their destination of 100%
harvest. And little wonder theyÂ keep tripping. That's the fate of all those who
rely on lame horses. Now to theÂ question on everyone's lips, be he an
intellectual or an imbecile: IfÂ Christianity, as they themselves confess albeit
in defence, has failed toÂ address the scourge of casteism and instead solidifies
it even more, then why atÂ all should the oppressed classes be made to change
religious colours?Â Elementary, Mr Evangelist!Â

Let's now move on toÂ the pride of Indian Christianity, the Dalits, for whom,
incidentally, theÂ 'casteless faithful' are vehemently fighting for the same
SC/ST benefits thatÂ are available to their counterparts in 'caste-ridden'
Hinduism. These are theÂ people who, owing to their sheer numbers and greater
distress (what arithmetic,Â what altruism!) had been 'identified' as 'ideal'
targets for conversion toÂ Christianity by the 'founding Fathers'. And in a true
measure of the success ofÂ their time-tested techniques, the Dalits, according
to some estimates, now formÂ a mammoth majority of the Christians of India.

These children of Hari -Â harijans -, as Gandhi used to refer to them, became
children of Jesus -Â let's baptise them as Jesusjans - in great numbers and with
greater hopesÂ of economic prosperity and more importantly, social
emancipation. Now do we knowÂ for sure, if Jesus had succeeded where Hari
failed? I quote below from a LetterÂ to the Editor published by a national daily a few years back:Â

"Any one who is awareÂ of the rural social scenario will agree with me that
Dalit Christians get theÂ same treatment as Hindu Dalits. Adding salt to
injury, they are also looked downÂ upon in their own religion.Â

Is it Christian thatÂ a few upper caste communities corner all the benefits
under the pretext ofÂ minority rights and corner power?Â

Is it Christian toÂ seek funds from abroad under the guise of evangelism and
social uplift byÂ selling Dalits' shame and helplessness in the West?Â

Is it Christian toÂ keep the Dalits off the power structure and manipulate
funds?Â

Is it Christian toÂ attach caste surnames to their Christian names and
identify themselves more withÂ the caste than Christ?Â

Is it Christian toÂ allot separate places in the Churches, separate chapels
and even separateÂ graveyards for their Dalit bretheren?Â

Is it Christian toÂ deny self-respect to the less privileged members of the
congregation?Â

Let us face things.Â Dalit members are being exploited in every way by the
power wielding upper casteÂ Christians.Â

To plead for theÂ Dalits in public posing as their protectors, and to kick
them in private hasÂ become the order of the day in many Churches."Â

Amen! Need I sayÂ anymore of the fate of the Jesusjans? It is doubtful if
these type ofÂ letters will find a place in the 'suddenly secular', 'minority
sensitive'Â national dailies of today. On the contrary the flavour of the season
in theÂ media now is to join the chorus of lies let loose by the evergreen
evangelistsÂ whose stock of untruths has neither bottom nor a cap.In feigning
outrage, theÂ Christian outfits are a class by themselves. What a hue and cry
about theÂ neighbour, when actually, it is their own cupboards that are
overflowing withÂ skeletons! Indeed, crocodiles must learn some lessons from
these holy humbugs onÂ how to shed tears for their'victims'. Such perfection of pretence can only comeÂ by practice. And the secular playfield offers them ample scope for that.Â

But in theirÂ evangelical euphoria, they seem to be overdoing their bit,
unmindful of the fourÂ fingers pointing inward. Their claims fly in the face of
facts. Now, why notÂ book these jittery Johnnies under the law banning forcible
conversions forÂ continuing to make false promises to the gullible and then
luring them intoÂ their fold? After all there is as much casteism, if not more,
in Christianity asÂ in Hinduism; so how can they mis-represent their 'product'
to be a better one?Â If this does not constitute fraudulent means, I wonder
what else does. IÂ hereby rest myÂ case!

http://www.newstodaynet.com/crusade/221102.htmÂ
CRUCIFYINGÂ MORALITYÂ Â Â Â Â Â Â
Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â Â
http://www.newstodaynet.com/crusade/251102.htm
BELIEVERSÂ BEWARE!

**acharya** · 05-20-2006, 12:52 PM

http://www.newstodaynet.com/crusade.htm

05-20-2006, 09:34 PM

QUOTEUntouchability not Hinduism-Ashok Singhal
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
www.organiser.org
âAshok Singhal
The Manu Smriti or the Yagyavalkya Smriti has no connection with Adi Manu or the Sage Yagyavalkya. The Smritis were written during the reign of Pushyamitra about 2200 years ago. There is no reference of such Smritis in the Mahabharata also,â said Shri Ashok Singhal, VHP president in a statement issued in New Delhi recently.

He said, âThere are two portions in the SmritisâYama and Niyama. Yama consists of eternal values while the Niyamas were the periodic governing laws or codes of conduct meant for running the affairs of the state of the then kings. There are more than 300 Smritis. They have little to do with the eternal values of dharma. These have been responsible for gross discrimination that is alien to our concept of ekaatmataa (integralism) that is expounded in our ancient scripturesâthe Shrutis (the four Vedasâthe eternal revealed scriptures) and the Upanishads.â

Shri Singhal said that the caste untouchability never existed in Hindu society. âIt is the creation of the Muslim rule. Because those who fought and refused to embarace Islam were punished for their commitment to their indigenous ethos and thrown out of the society as untouchables. These heroic people are enlisted as Scheduled Castes. We must differentiate between the Scheduled Castes and the shudras. Shudras were held with respect before the advent of the Smritis and the Scheduled Castes are of recent origin created during the Muslim rule,â he added.

The Vishwa Hindu Parishad totally rejects the Manu Smriti as it has no place in a civilised society. The Dharma Sansad and the Margadarshak Mandal of VHP have totally rejected the caste untouchability. They have decided to give Mantra Deeksha without any discrimination. He said in the Vedas, there is no discrimination amongst the four Varnas. All are considered genius and masterminds in their own fields and all looked upon one another with respect. Recitation of the Vedic mantras in daily life was practiced by the entire society irrespective of Varnas. (FOC)

05-26-2006, 04:13 AM

<img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/argue.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='argue.gif' /> The communists have done well for themselves in coming to power in Bengal and Kerala and now have a strong presence in the UPA at the Centre. A quick look around will show that Karl Marxâs philosophy is relevant in the social turmoil that we are witnessing in our country today.

"The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles"

This is evident in the demands made by the anti reservationists. They demand that caste based reservations be replaced by economic based reservations. This implies class divisions as opposed to caste divisions. Either way the oppressed or the economically underprivileged will make their struggle felt through democratic means!

"The separate individuals form a class only in so far as they have to carry on a common battle against another class; otherwise they are on hostile terms with each other as competitors"

How true this is in the modern context too! Just replace the word âclassâ by âcasteâ in the above statement and we have visions of Hindus and Muslims warring against each other when the Dalits and non Dalit Hindus are not bickering about dominance.

"Religious distress is at the same time the expression of real distress and the protest against real distress. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of an unspiritual situation. It is the opium of the people"

The day of Godmen is here! We have Sri Sri Ravishankar being invited to address the European Parliament in Brussels. The God/Godmen channels are vying for eyeballs on the television. Every other day there are faith healing meetings held for the general public by various religion denominations, attended by hordes of âdevoteesâ.

"Religious alienation as such occurs only in the sphere of consciousness, in the inner life of man, but economic alienation is that of real life. . . . It therefore affects both aspects"

Touche!

**acharya** · 06-02-2006, 02:01 AM

Racism Enforced by Jews in Israel & "Jews of India"

According to Adalah, by 1993 over 80% of the land within Israel that was once owned by Palestinians had been confiscated. Today, 93% of Israel's land can only be used by those who are legally defined as Jewish.
By S.V. Rajadurai

One of the cynical ironies of the history is that the Jews, millions of whose members were swallowed up in the anti-Semetic furnaces of Nazis, produced from amongst them a reverse racism whose victims are the Arabs particularly the Palestinians whose land the Zionists have been forcibly occupying for more than a half a century. The Western powers, especially the US, have no qualms in admitting at least formally the existence of racisms practised against the Blacks, Nazi atrocities against the Jews and the White supremacist apartheid policy practised in South America. But in the case of the tragic victims of the Zionists, the propaganda from the West has succeeded in portraying the victims as terrorists and the perpetrators as the defenders of the right to a legitimate statehood. It is therefore essential to elaborate on the nature of the Israeli racism.

From its origins in the 19th century, Zionism centred on the idea of creating a specifically Jewish state in which Jews would be protected and privileged over non-Jews. Zionist occupation of Palestine was at first meagre, amounting to about 10% of the population by 1900. By 1947, Jews were still only about 30% of the population of Mandate Palestine and owned only 6% of the land. However, by means of the 1947-48 war, Israel took over huge new expanses of land and forcibly expelled about 750,000 Palestinians. This travesty was the basis for the official founding of the Israeli state.

Inside what is called the "Green line" â the unofficial borders of Israel before the 1967 war âthere are still about 1 million Palestinians, just under 20% of the total Israeli population. Most Palestinians are Muslims, some are Christian. A small number of non-Palestinian Arabs also live there. From 1948 to 1966, the Palestinians within Israel lived under explicit military rule. They were considered a military threat to the Israeli state, and they were ruled under a completely different set of laws than the Jews.

Second Class Citizens
After 1966, military rule was lifted, but it was replaced by a set of Jim Crow-like laws designed to discriminate against Arabs in Israel. According to Adalah, an Arab rights organization in Israel, today there are at least 20 laws that specifically provide unequal rights and obligations based on what the Israelis call nationality, which in Israel is defined on the basis of religion. Israelis must carry a card, which identifies them as either a Jew, a Muslim or a Christian. All non-Jews are second-class citizens, legally and practically. The Israeli Supreme Court has literally dismissed all cases which dealt with equal rights for Arab citizens. All Israeli citizens, including Palestinians, have the right to vote in elections for members of the Knesset (parliament) and for the prime minister. However, under Israeli law, any political candidate who indicates "a denial of the existence of the State of Israel as a State of the Jewish people" shall be disqualified â anyone who advocates for equal rights or Arabs is thereby ineligible.

Other rights are legally defined as nationality rights and are reserved for Jews only. If one is a Jew, she/he has exclusive use of land, privileged access to private and public employment, special educational loans, home mortgages, preferences for admission to universities, and many other things. Many other special privileges are reserved for those who have served in the Israeli military, which is compulsory for all Jews (male and female) but excludes Palestinians.

According to Adalah, by 1993 over 80% of the land within Israel that was once owned by Palestinians had been confiscated. Today, 93% of Israel's land can only be used by those who are legally defined as Jewish.

Moreover, despite Israel's booming economy, Palestinian unemployment stands about 40% in 1996 twice as many Arab citizens (28.3%) as Jewish citizens (14.4%) lived below the poverty line. Less than 5% of government employees are Arab and only three of 641 managers of government companies are Arab. Eighty percent of all student drop outs are Arab. There are also vast disparities between Arab towns and Jewish towns in government spending on schools, medical systems, roads, electricity, clean water, and social services.

Unlike any other country in the world, Israel does not define itself as a state of its residents, or even a state of its citizens, but as a state of all the Jews in the world. Jews from anywhere in the world can travel to Israel, declare citizenship, and be granted all the privileges of being Jewish that are denied to Palestinians who have lived in the area for hundreds of years. By contrast, there is no chance for a non-Jew to acquire Israeli citizenship, let alone be granted equal rights.

Mass Murders Justified
The years of occupation have created, or have allowed to flourish, an incredibly racist vantage point among the majority of Israeli Jews. The majority of Israeli Jews are willing to accept the killing of Palestinians and collective punishment of the Palestinian population as justified state policy.

Not surprisingly, Palestinians inside Israel have historically felt themselves excluded and disempowered by the Israeli government. There has come into being a permanent domination over something that might be called a Palestinian state but what would really amount to a dependent Bantustan. This is essentially the same vision that motivated apartheid South Africa. And there are even more complexities. Within Israel there are really four levels of citizenship; the first three being various levels of Jewish participation in Israeli society, which are thoroughly realized. At the top of the pyramid is the Ashkenazi, the White European Jews. The huge contingent of recent Russian immigrants â now about 20% of Israeli Jews â are being assimilated into this European-Ashkenazi sector, though they are retaining a very distinct cultural identity.

Racism within Jews
The next level down, which is now probably the largest component of the Jewish population, is the Mizrachi or Sephardic Jews, who are from the Arab countries.At the bottom of the Jewish pyramid are the Ethiopian Jews, who are Black.One can go into the poorest parts of Jewish West Jerusalem and find that they're predominantly Ethiopian. This social and economic stratification took shape throughout the last 50 years as different groups of Jews from different part of the world came, for very different reasons, to Israel. So while the divisions reflected national origins, they play out in a profoundly racialized way. The Yemeni Jews in particular faced extraordinary discrimination. They were more or less transported involuntarily from Yemen to Israel.

On arrival they were held in primitive camps, and many Yemeni babies were stolen from their mothers and given for adoption to Ashkenazi families. In the early 1990s a high-profile campaign began to try to reunite some of those shattered families.

Beneath all these layers of Jews come the Palestinian citizens. A legally defined and highly racialized hierarchy orchestrates Israeli social life.

The most significant difference is in the world's perception of this reality. For the overwhelming majority of the world's population, South Africa was always considered an ostracized state. But Israel is not in that position. Israel is given a pass on the question of racism. Because Jews were subject to the Nazi Holocaust there's a way in which Israeli Jews are assumed to be either incapable of such terrible racialized policies, or that it's somehow understandable.

To sump up: Racism is systematic - it constructs myths and theories of superior and inferior races, and uses scientific and religious arguments to justify its premises. Racism naturalises prejudice and discrimination, makes it appear to be in the nature of things. That is, people who are dark-skinned, by definition, do not deserve to be treated as human beings and may be considered on par with domestic animals. Racism is never a set of ideas, rather it is a system of lies, half-truths and myths that explains, rationalises and renders normal a social and economic system of inequality, discrimination and violence.

What is Racism?
Racism produces not merely prejudicial attitudes and opinions but suggests forms of behaviour and action â it encourages discrimination, hatred, fear, anxiety, actively creates ghettos for entire communities.

Racism seeks to establish a permanent group hierarchy based on unbridgeable differences. It creates two societies within one: the ruling race that is superior and the other races that are inferior â often within the so-called inferior races, some are deemed to be superior to others. Racism determines forms of living â it tells societies who should live where, sets the limits for social interaction and punishes those who break these carefully laid-out rules.

In a racist society, the ruling races and the ruled races are infected with its poisonous ideas the ruled too come to subscribe to a purist argument, they believe that races ought not to mix.

Racism & Women
In a racist society, women of the ruling race also subscribe to racist ideas. Women of the ruled races are told that they are good for nothing but labour and forced sex. However, in a fundamental sense, racism is anti-women. It is misogynist âin racist societies, the ruling race defines its purity chiefly on the basis of the character of its women âthe chastity of the women of the so-called superior race is considered the most significant index of that race's honour, likewise the alleged promiscuity of the women of the so-called inferior races is believed to reflect the inevitable lowness of those races.

Racist societies fear miscegenation â or a mixing of the races through sexual love and marriage. Hence, they lay the onus of preventing miscegenation on women. By the same logic, they allow men to have relationships with women from different races, but women, especially of the so-called superior races, are asked to abjure such relationships in the interest of racial purity.

Casteism is Racism
India is a caste society â groups of people are arranged within a hierarchical system according to what Babasaheb Ambedkar called "a graded inequality", so that every caste considers the caste immediately above it superior to itself and the one below it, inferior. Or as Periyar E.V. Ramaswamy, the great social reformer of South India, put it every member of the Indian society is tainted with casteism and the notion of Untouchability in a graded way like the rungs of a ladder. Of course, within any given context, castes relate to each other in several ways âthrough trade, work, services, festivals and rituals. But in each of these instances, the relative superiority or inferiority of the caste is important.

Is caste like race? After all, some castes are considered impure by birth, just as some races are considered naturally inferior. Casteism like racism is also systematic â it structures unequal social and economic order. Caste society also creates its ghettos â separate living quarters for the so-called Untouchables. Likewise, caste divides society into mutually mistrustful groups. Women in caste society occupy a position similar to women in a racially divided society â their honour is central to a caste's self-definition.

Difference between Race & Caste
In spite of these similarities, caste operates differently from race. In a racist society, the physical similarity of races, their modes of bodily being, defined along religious, ethnic or linguistic backgrounds, are important. They help to mark off differences between the superior and the inferior.

In caste society, as Babasaheb Ambedkar pointed out, no such uniformity can be observed. Brahmins of Punjab and Madras are not physically similar, neither are the so-called Untouchables from these two states. Secondly, racist ideology is open and transparent in its logic of superiority and inferiority, caste ideology is not. It is convoluted, deceptive and cunning â the Brahmins reserve for themselves the right to determine what makes them superior. In a certain context it may be their priestly vocation, in another it may be their so-called gift for computer science. Likewise, other castes too constantly and in keeping with the demands of the times re-invent themselves, pushing themselves closer to the Brahmins or articulating an identity that owes nothing to them.

Thirdly, caste society conceals its essential violence much more successfully than racist societies.

Why No One Speaks of Indiaâs Racism?

For example, the entire world knew of and commiserated with the conditions of segregation under apartheid in South Africa but very few people applied the same logic when it came to the routine segregation that is practised in several parts of India â against Dalits and other lower castes.

Lastly, caste unlike race does not allow for a horizontal alliance amongst people of different castes. In a racist society, all races considered inferior come together to fight a racist social order.

Racism in India
In caste society, such unity is difficult because of the condition of graded inequality âcastes view themselves and each other as inferior and superior or simply unique and only in very exceptional historical circumstances have come together to challenge the caste system. This does not mean that the logic of race does not exist in India âlinguistic and religious groups sometimes claim superior status over people who speak other languages and practise different religions. In different ways, this has happened in Assam and Kashmir. For the past ten years and more majoritarian Hindu groups have attempted to proclaim a sort of racial unity of all Hindus against all others, in this case Muslims and Christians. In doing so, they have attempted to tide over the contradictions of caste, arguing that all Hindus, irrespective of caste status, are one, especially against Muslims and Christians.

Gujarat Genocide
The endemic underdevelopment that plagues the North-eastern states and Kashmir, the clear violation of human rights by the police and the armed forces in these regions, the systematic violence against Muslims and Christians (in an earlier instance, against the Sikhs) in various parts of the country are matters that the Government of India appears loath to take seriously. The racial-type of discrimination that the sections of the majority Hindu community wants to impose on the minority communities â through false propaganda and planned violence âis often considered a matter of civil rather than political import and seldom attracts legislative action.

Even when it does, as was evident in the findings of the Sri Krishna Commission that investigated the Mumbai riots of the 1990s, political pressures edge out legislative concerns. Most recently âfrom the first week of March 2002 to almost four months â the BJP led Government in the state of Gujarat in Western India presided over the organised pogroms against the Muslims of the State, in what the Hindu right claimed to be the first laboratory experiment of cleansing India of the anti-patriotic aliens.

As in racist societies, women have been made central to this communal project: Hindu women are warned of the predatory sexual nature of Muslim men, stories are circulated about the hidden immorality of Catholic nuns. On the other hand, Hindu men are told that Muslim and Christian women are not like their women they do not observe those norms of chastity that are dear to Hindu women and, therefore, are fit subjects for assault. During the recent carnage in Gujarat, hundreds of Muslim women were raped, mutilated and burnt alive. The pregnant Muslim women were targeted particularly. Their wombs were slit open, the foetuses removed and thrown into the flames. Tanika Sarkar, the historian gives a chilling description of the ghastly events that targeted the Muslims, especially their women in Gujarat.

Anti Muslim Violence
Hindu mobs swooped down upon Muslim women and children with multiple but related aims. First to possess and dishonour them and their men, second to taste what is denied to them and what according to their understanding, explains Muslim virility. Third to physically destroy the vagina and the womb and thereby to symbolically destroy the source of pleasure, reproduction and nurture for Muslim men and for Muslim children. Then by beatings, to punish the fertile female body. Then by physically destroying the children to signify an end to Muslim growth. Then by cutting up the foetus and burning it, to achieve a symbolic destruction of future generations of the very future of Muslims themselves.

The burning of men, women and children as the final move served multiple functions: It was to destroy evidence, it was to make Muslims vanish, it was also to desecrate Muslim deaths by denying them an Islamic burial and forcing a Hindu cremation upon them, a kind of a macabre post-mortem forced conversion. There were, thus many layers of signification of symbolic meanings that went into the act that were repeated by different mobs at different locales, but on fairly identical lines.

Rape as a Religious Duty
They can be aligned to sangh teachings, stereotypes and fantasies. This also explains why the same female body was subjected to a series of sexual humiliation, torture, mutilation and obliteration. Conjoined with the bodies of their children, they provided a site where the entire drama of revenge was enacted in its long and complicated sequence.

This motif of hateful revenge has been rendered affective and consensual through a variety of means, chiefly through sustained and intense propaganda and hate talk:

... All the boys in the shakhas are bred on: partition time rapes of Hindu women, rapes of Hindu queens under Muslim rule, abductions of Hindu women all through history by Muslims. There is also the perpetual fear of a more virile Muslim male body that lures away Hindu girls, a kind of penis envy and anxiety about emasculation that can only be overcome by doing violent deeds.

Violence for the Sangh is both source and proof of maleness. In the 1990s, when communal violence had intensified, bangles were sent to localities where riots had not taken place, to taunt Hindu men with effeminacy. At Jawaharlal Nehru University, a post-Godhra procession of the ABVP chanted: Jis Hinduon ka khoon na khola, who hindu nahin, woh hijra hain (those Hindus whose blood does not boil, are not Hindus, they are eunuchs).

This identification between killing and masculinity, is a strong and uniquely sangh teaching. In Gujarat, mobs who raped, sometime came dressed in khakhi shorts or in saffron underwear, rape being obviously seen as a religious duty, a sangh duty. In times of violence, Hindu male sexual organs must function as instruments of torture.

The state government of Tamil Nadu presided over by an authoritarian Chief Minister Jayalalitha has recently passed an Act banning religious conversions based amongst other things, coercion and allurements and makes it compulsory for any new convert as well as the proselytiser to report the conversion to the local magistrate.

S. African Law against Racism
In several countries in Europe and in the United States, there exist formal provisions in law that penalise racial discrimination. There are also affirmative action laws that enable people from communities that have been historically discriminated against to enter higher education and get worthy jobs. Most recently, in South Africa, where apartheid has been officially dismantled, that country's Constitution has created an exceptional legal framework within which all communities could seek and get equality and rights.

However, in all these countries, including United States and South Africa the structures of racism have not been successfully challenged of transformed.

Racism in America was and is a system that privileges Whites as a whole over people of colour â this extends to education, employment, housing, and access to culture.

Likewise in South Africa, apartheid was not merely a system of legally sanctioned segregation and discrimination. Apartheid existed to provide the big industrial houses of South Africa ârun by local and multinational capital âto extract work under extremely cheap and repressive conditions from that country's non-White people, specially people of African origin.

Indiaâs Sham Laws Against Racism
Anti-racist legislation in the United States has not addressed the question of poverty and illiteracy of people of colour, especially of those who are known as Afro-Americans. Likewise, in spite of a fine Constitution, in practical terms, neither justice nor equality is possible in South Africa, because that country's rulers are not interested in challenging the economic basis of apartheid.

Also and especially in South Africa, anti-racist and progressive legislation has not meant benefits for women. In the United States, the general absence of laws that empower and enable poor women both White and women of colour, in an economic sense, has meant that women continue to work hard, raise children with little or no support from the state are the first to be fired in times of crisis, the lost to be hired in good times. Further in South Africa, given the long history of racial hatred and apartheid and the general impact this has had on communities of African origin, there has been an increase in the incidence of rape. This problem continues to haunt post-apartheid South Africa.

As in the USA, India has protective as well as punitive legislation to empower lower castes especially the so-called Untouchables. Untouchability has been declared constitutionally invalid and recognized as a crime against the state. Various sorts of compensatory discrimination, the best known of which is the system of reservations in education and employment in government for the so-called lower of Backward Castes, as they are referred to exist in India. Economic support for castes lower in the hierarchy also exists in the form of subsidies and loans under various welfare schemes.

Yet these laws do not address the economic logic of caste and the fact that caste differences also determine access to education, employment, wealth and social status. Reservations would be effective if the Indian State insisted on compulsory primary and secondary education but in the absence of such laws very few children from the backward and Untouchable communities make it into higher education.

Womenâs Contribution
Likewise, if rural poverty was tackled through land reform legislation and laws against exploitative trade and labour practices, economic support in the form of subsidies and loans make sense. Otherwise, they remain measures undertaken by an essentially cynical state that does not wish to challenge the economics of the caste system.

With respect to women, protective legislation is particularly inadequate âthe reservations in education and employment do not insist that as many women as men ought to be taken into higher education and jobs. The hidden economic contributions of women from the lower castes are seldom acknowledged by India's economic planners, neither their unpaid housework, nor the work they do in private, unregistered sweatshops and factories. Further whatever punitive legislation exists to protect the lower castes, especially the Dalits from violence is not effective when it comes to Dalit women, who are routinely assaulted in their places of work.

Durban Conference
Let us now return to the Durban conference. In Aug.2001 R.K.W. Goonesekere presented his working paper on work and descent-based discrimination to the UN sub-commission on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights at the fifty third session of the sub commission. Because of time and other constraints, Goonesekere limited the paper's focus to the Asian Countries of India, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Japan but stated that further study of African countries in particular was warranted.

The presentation of the paper and the ensuing debate amongst sub commission experts that followed, marked the first time that caste based discrimination was discussed as a major source of human rights violations world-wide by a UN Human Rights body. The sub-commission, while accepting Goonesekere's Working Paper (E/CN.4/sub.2/2001/16) also determined by consensus to extend the study to other regions of the world where work and descent-based discrimination continues to be experienced (the study was to be produced before the next session of the sub commission in 2002). Goonesekere says in his report:

U.N. Report on Indiaâs Racism
Discrimination based on work and descent is a long-standing practice in many societies throughout the world and affects a large portion of the world's population. Discrimination based descent manifests itself most notably in caste â (or tribe) â based distinctions. These distinctions, determined by birth, result in serious violations across the full spectrum of civil, cultural, economic, political and social rights. Likewise, the nature of a person's work or occupation is often the reason for, or a result of, discrimination against the person. Persons who perform the least desirable jobs in a society are often victims of double discrimination, suffering first from the nature of the work they must perform and suffering again by the denial of their rights because they perform work that is unacceptable. In most cases, a person's descent determines or is intimately connected with the type of work they are afforded in the society. Victims of discrimination based on descent are singled out, not because of a difference in physical appearance or race, but rather by their membership in an endogamous social group that has been isolated socially and occupationally from other groups in the society.

Indian Govt. Mischief
But the Government of India was seen to exert official pressure to prevent Goonesekere from carrying out his task. The argument the Government of India placed before the UN human rights bodies, including the WCAR was that caste discrimination is not an issue relevant to the evaluation of its performance vis-a-vis the human rights conventions to which it is party. This argument is based on three main premises.

1. Caste is not race: The term "caste" does not denote race or racial grouping and even the term "descent" in Article 1 of the CERD convention refers solely to racial descent. Therefore, does not fall within the ambit of racism, racial discrimination or related intolerance.

N.C.D.H.R. Rebuttal
2. Only internal mechanisms, not external ones: Numerous laws and government schemes exist already within the country to promote the welfare, rights and socio-economic conditions of the Scheduled Castes. These are adequate to protect the Dalits from discrimination and to promote their socio-economic advancement, therefore, there is no need to utilise international human rights mechanisms and bodies to strengthen these laws.

3. Change takes time: Change is a slow process and respective countries are doing all they can to solve the problem.

Powerful rebuttals to these arguments came from Dalit side, especially the National Campaign for Dalit Human Rights (NCDHR) that was in the Facilitation Committee of the NGO Forum that conducted the Parallel Conference in Durban. The major points of its counter-arguments are: Caste may not be race but it is caste discrimination like racism, is a violation of human rights.
The first premise of the Indian Government's argument against inclusion of caste discrimination in the WCAR has already been dealt with and dismissed by the CERD committee.
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S.V. Rajadurai is the co-author of the book, Towards a Non-Brahmin Millennium: From Ayothee Thass to Periyar, Samya, Calcutta, 1998.
A portion of the Introduction written by the author to the book, Racism & Casteism (2002), is reproduced to prove that the Hindu religion's most important principle of caste system is nothing but racism. But, says the author, just as the world is ignoring the gory racism enforced against Palestinians by the Jews inside Israel, it is also not taking note of the much more serious racism practised by India's Brahminical rulers, called the "Jews of India".

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