Political
Diary
New Delhi, 10 August
2021
Caste Cauldron
I AM A DALIT, WHO ARE
YOU?
By Poonam I Kaushish
“The naïve notion
that we can preserve freedom by exuding goodwill is not only silly, but
dangerous,” wrote former US President Nixon in his book The Real War. His words
of caution are water off a duck’s back as our netagan ready to celebrate 75th Independence Day. Replete with
syrupy speeches of Sab Ka Saath, Sab Ka
Vikas and ‘Atma Nirbhar Bharat’ which resonate to the aam aadmi’s raucous silence!
Sadly, 75 years on nothing
seems to have changed. The past continues to survive and thrive in the present:
Of India in the vicious tentacles of caste cauldron wherein Dalits, the most
downtrodden citizens of an unforgiving Hindu caste hierarchy condemns them to
the bottom of the heap.
In the last ten days caste
hatred against “untouchables” barred its poisonous fangs again. The contemptuous
‘mockery’ dance, firecrackers bursting and caste slurs by upper castes men in UP’s Haridwar
outside India’s Women Hockey Captain Vandana Katariya's house after the
hockey team lost to Argentina in the Olympics semifinals stands testimony to
this. They were furious and blamed the loss due to many Dalit players.
In Delhi a 9-year old
poor Dalit girl was gang-raped by priests who then hurriedly cremated her,
resulting in a political slugfest between Congress and BJP. Rahul’s visit to
the family and pledging to stand by them while reminding its rival of shrugging
off responsibility by undermining the incident led to the Saffron Brigade
accusing him of being selective to further his political agenda while being
silent on atrocities of Dalits in Congress-ruled Punjab, Rajasthan and
Chhattisgarh.
Amidst this some States
are demanding a caste census which mercifully has been shot down by the Modi Sarkar. From Kashmir to Kanyakumari,
Maharashtra to Manipur caste explosions and exploitations rule the roost. Whereby,
it has become the most luscious mistress to be measured through the prism of
power glass politics. With parties defining it according to its own warped and
selfish needs, never mind if the countryside air is rent with cries of agony
and aversion.
Despite laws to
protect Dalits, more than 46,000 crimes against them were reported last year according to official statistics. Nine States:
Rajasthan, UP, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Gujarat, Andhra, Telangana, Kerala and Odisha
accounted for 84% crimes against them in 2019 though they constitute 25% of
population and 33.2% of prisoners in jails.
Shockingly, 15 Dalit
women are raped every day in India according to the National Crime Records
Bureau. Between 2009-19 while assault incidents saw a marginal drop of 5% rapes
of Dalit women went up alarmingly by 159% from 1,346 to 3,486 and the conviction
rate is just 32%.
Rising aspirations
among young Dalits have fuelled violence against them by upper-caste members
who are unable to accept this. Their crime can be as trivial as growing a
moustache, marrying beyond their caste, riding a horse, passing through an
upper caste locality etc.
Fueled by Mandalistation
of politics which changed our polity. Whereby, it is now polarised on caste
basis with elections being fought on caste considerations. Voters are
regressively but decisively voting along caste lines. This social engineering
via the ballot has become the mainstay. After all, why should the Brahmins and
Thakurs, a mere 15% of the vote bank, rule the roost? In other words, political
consciousness today terminates at the caste and community level.
Consequently, this
social chasm widened with the emergence of “Made in India” leaders like Lalu,
Mulayam and Mayawati. If Lalu’s RJD kid gloved the forwards with his massive
backward following, Mulayam’s SP played his Yadav and Muslim card to the hilt
in Government and judicial appointments. Mayawati’s BSP revealed in “transfer
Raj”, replacing many upper caste officers by Dalit officials.
Thereby, giving the
rootless down-trodden a new identity and attitudinal changes. In fact, disdain
for “untouchables” inherited over generations, coupled with entrenched misogyny
in a patriarchal society and social justification flowing from patriarchy make upper
castes extremely intolerant to Dalits trying to rectify their mis-fortune by
birth.
Not just that. With
everyone propounding their own recipes of caste harmony, the nation is getting
sucked into the vortex of centrifugal bickering. So caught up are our leaders
in their frenzied pursuit of political nirvana
through caste separatism that they confuse themselves.
Touch any sphere of
life --- political, social, economic, administrative, educational and judicial
caste has spread into its vitals. Tragically, bringing things to such a pass
whereby everything today has degenerated into the caste paradigm.
Clearly, in the Kafkaesque
world where caste vs caste fight and
decide one’s fate no Party wants to jeopordise its caste vote banks. Wherein,
the fight for getting the upper hand and votes has been reduced to politics of
optics and perception, underscoring present reality and exposes the
socio-political undercurrents at play.
Leading to rising
tensions between castes over perceived injustices and demand for quotas stem
from unfulfilled aspirations of employment and upward mobility. Simultaneously,
quotas have failed to either solve the job problem or promote inclusion. The
socio-political trajectory of the Dalit community is marked by frustrations and
entrapments. Think, Dalit political activists have risen to political
prominence thanks to their alliance with either the BJP or Congress. But as a
community, they routinely fail to make an impact on the political process.
Trapped in the
distortions of the political economy and rendered rudderless by the political
bankruptcy of their leaderships, communities inevitably retreat to three
things: Mutual suspicion, assertion of caste pride/identity and a confrontation
in the shadows of history and memory. A sure recipe for inter-community
violence.
Woefully, our leaders
refuse to see the Frankenstein they have unleashed and are unwilling to learn
from history. The past tells us that all clashes in India have been based on
caste. From Bihar’s Thakur-Dalit violence in Belchi 1976,
Punjab’s Jat-Sikh insurgency 1980-1990’s and Kashmir’s two-decades of
continuing Hindus-Pandits ethnic cleansing by
pro-Pak militants.
With all merrily
playing the caste zero-sum game it is now difficult to recognize India as the
same country which Emerson described as the “summit of human thought. Clearly, if
political consciousness terminates at the caste level, the day is not far when
divisive caste combinations will dominate Indian politics. Granted it will be
suicidal not to take cognizance of the new-found aspirations of Dalits.
As it stands,
vote-banks on caste lines are easier to build. At the same time, it is equally
dangerous to indulge in ongoing caste power games, caste rivalries and politics
of brinkmanship. By that token, the whole social reform movement will become
meaningless, a ‘must’ for any modern nation that wishes to forge ahead.
Undeniably, our
leaders are either unable or unwilling to break out of the caste mould. In the
long run, this is bound to increase dissatisfaction all around. By making
noises and finding a scapegoat, our polity runs the risk of changing major
political alignments on caste lines.
India stands
testimony to the fact that power in privilege stands further transformed
through electoral competition into power in numbers. Time now for our petty
power-at-all cost polity to think beyond vote-bank politics and look at the
long-term implications. Which, if not arrested, could well boomerang on them
and spell danger to our democracy. What
gives? ---- INFA
(Copyright, India News & Feature Alliance)
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