The Forgotten Children of God

http://www.escapingamerica.com/Sharad.htm

http://www.asiasource.org/asip/dalits.cfm

http://www.atributetohinduism.com/Caste_System.htm

Caste System or varna-ashrama has been one of the most misrepresented, misinformed, misunderstood, misused and the most maligned aspects of Hinduism. If one wants to understand the truth, the original purpose behind the caste system, one must go to antiquity to study the evolution of the caste system. Caste System, which is said to be the mainstay of the Hindu social order, has no sanction in the Vedas. The ancient culture of India was based upon a system of social diversification according to SPIRITUAL development, not by birth, but by his karma. This system became hereditary and over the course of many centuries degenerated as a result of exploitation by some priests, and other socio-economic elements of society.

However, as Alain Danielou, son of French aristocracy, author of numerous books on philosophy, religion, history and arts of India, says: ``Caste system has enabled Hindu civilization to survive all invasions and to develop without revolutions or important changes, throughout more than four millennia, with a continuity that is unique in history. Caste system may appear rigid to our eyes because for more than a thousand years Hindu society withdrew itself from successive domination by Muslims and Europeans. Yet, the greatest poets and the most venerated saints such as Sura Dasa, Kabir, Tukaram, Thiruvalluvar and Ram Dasa; came from the humblest class of society.`` In the words of Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan, `` In spite of the divisions, there is an inner cohesion among the Hindu society from the Himalayas to the Cape Comorin.``

Caste system has been exploited against the Hindus, for the last two centuries by the British, Christian Missionaries, Secular historians, Communists, Muslims, Pre and Post-Independence Indian politicians and Journalists for their own ends. One way to discredit any system is to highlight its excesses, and this only adds to the sense of inferiority that many Indians feel about their own culture. Caste system is often portrayed as the ultimate horror, in the media, yet social inequities continue to persist in theoretically Egalitarian Western Societies. The Caste system is judged offensive by the Western norms, yet racial groups have been isolated, crowded into reserves like the American Indians or Australian Aborigines, where they can only atrophy and disappear. Caste system served a purpose, performed certain functions, and met the needs appropriate to the times in history. However, Caste system is not stagnant and is undergoing changes under the impact of modernization. Caste system should undergo reforms in the social arena so that unjustified discrimination is eliminated.

http://www.asiasource.org/asip/dalits.cfm

Dalits in India 2000: The Scheduled Castes more than a half century after Independence

New York: September 27, 2000

Shyama Venkateswar Good afternoon. My name is Shyama Venkateswar. I am a Senior Program Officer at the Asia Society. I am pleased to welcome to the Asia Society, Mr. Sainath, both a journalist and an author and currently an Eisenhower fellow travelling across the United States. He has also previously been a distinguished visiting professor at the University of Iowa, Times of India fellow and a deputy editor at The Blitz in Bombay. He is the author of Everybody Loves a Good Drought: Stories from India’s Poorest District, which is now in its eighth printing.

Sainath’s work is on the Dalit question in India. As many of you know Dalit literally means oppressed, downtrodden and it is a category that is used to describe 16 percent of India’s population or almost 160 million people. Mr Sainath was given an award from Amnesty International for his article on ``A Dalit goes to Court.``

The Dalit issue today is one of the worst examples of discrimination against, and the oppressive living conditions of, millions of people in India. This discrimination persists despite government efforts to improve the situation through affirmative action policies and land reform policies in the last 50 years which were ostensibly directed toward access to education and government jobs and geared towards improving the condition of bonded laborers. Of course, we cannot discount the fact that some upward mobility has occurred for Dalits, but the mobility has clear regional differences in terms of land ownership, political power and social status.





It is precisely this kind of uneven mobility and the low status of this group that calls into question the effectiveness of government policies and also focuses on the inherent prejudices and racism, if you will, within the caste system in India. Finally, and I hope Mr. Sainath will touch on this, a critical element in discussing the status of Dalits in India is the question of women within the Dalit community who face the dual brunt of discrimination - based on their caste and their gender. With this introduction, I now turn to Mr. Sainath. Welcome.

http://www.thingsasian.com/goto_article/article.1261.html

Devdaasis

By Nabanita Dutt

Sometime around 250 A.D., a man called Vatsayana wrote Kamasutra, a crafty little compilation of various ways to conduct one`s sexual life. The book is hilarious in parts, where Vatsayana, in all seriousness, instructs women - from princesses to prostitutes - on how to attach themselves to men and keep them interested. What caught the world`s attention though, were the myriad ways of performing the sexual act - information the author apparently gleaned by climbing up trees to peer into people`s bedrooms, hiding under their beds, or at times, bribing courtesans to allow him a ring-side seat.

The puzzling aspect of Kamasutra, for which historians have no answer, is why Vatsayana completely ignored a section of women - the `devdaasis` or `temple prostitutes` -- who could have certainly taught him a thing or two. The devdaasi cult was very much in existence in Vatsayana`s time (mentions of them can be found in texts dating back to the 6th century B.C.).

A tradition older than the more celebrated Geisha in Japan, much of the devdaasi`s history is lost in time and little has been written about them in the English language. Even Indians have a fuzzy idea about who they really are and how they live -- all they see are newspaper reports which get printed from time to time about how some devdaasi has been `saved` from the profession by the government and returned back to society.

The cult of the devdaasi was born out of religion. `Devdaasi` literally means `female servant to the gods`. In ancient India, a need was felt to provide `live` companions to the village gods and goddesses, and even upper-caste families would `sacrifice` a daughter to the profession as part of their religious duty.

The job description, in the initial stages, had no sexual sub-text. In fact, devdaasis often enjoyed a high status in society because they could read and write, were trained in the arts and could weave and blend perfume. A young girl, no more than 9-12 years of age, would be chosen by her family to serve at the temple. The young `volunteer` would then have to go through a solemn rite of investiture in a special enrolling ceremony. The ceremony in effect, was a `marriage to the god`, after which the girl could take no more husbands. She lost all her previous worldly connections, such as family and friends, and would henceforth only be known as a devdaasi.

The name of this community of women would change from state to state. For example, in Orissa, they were known as `maharis`, in Andhra Pradesh they were called `devganikas` or `joginis` and in Karnataka, they were `basavis`.

Dance was considered a devotional act in those days, and all devdaasis had to go through rigorous training in their early years. A special enclosure, or `natmandir` was created within the temple precincts where the girls would dance to please the god, give him his meals and put him to bed.

For the head priests of the temple, as hot-blooded as any man, this bevy of women proved to be a rich hunting ground. Soon, the initiation ritual began to include a `deflowering ceremony`, known as `uditambuvadu` in some parts, whereby the priests would have sex with every girl enrolled at his temple as part of his religious perks.

The kings of the land then came into the picture and a scuffle followed over territorial rights. The priests claimed that as Brahmins, they were god`s representatives on earth, and anything offered to the gods belonged to them. The kings, on their part, insisted that since they were the ones to appoint the devdaasis and they were the lord of the land, the first right over these women was definitely theirs.

The conflict was ultimately resolved by an understanding that devdaasis in future would be branded on their chests with emblems - an eagle or a discus, if she belonged to the king, and a conch shell if she slept with the priest. Every Saturday, the king`s devdaasis would report at the palace and dance to please the palace deity, before satisfying the king himself. Some reports even suggest that they sometimes assisted the king in his politics and helped in espionage activities against enemy kings.

News gradually spread over the land that there were beautiful, young temple women to be had, and lesser rulers and chieftains began emulating the practices of the king. The high officials and rich traders refused to be left out of the game and bought rights to the devdaasis by paying hefty revenues to the temple.

From here on, the devdaasis continued their journey down to the dregs of society, and a time came when they services became available to almost every man in the town. A Marathi saying, ``Devdaasi devachi bayako, sarya gavachi`` (``Servant of god, but wife of the whole town``) aptly defines their position in the medieval era.

Obviously by then, the higher castes had stopped sending their girls into the profession, and the priests had to force the lower castes into donating their women by threatening them with divine vengeance.

Vermillion was dabbed on the foreheads of these women to announce their married status. Matted hair, a tattoo on the forehead and a wooden necklace identified them as devdaasis. They had to subsist on food gathered by begging with a metal concave bowl, which was given to them at the time of initiation. And they had to sleep with any man who could pay for their services. During fairs and religious festivals, the townsmen would gather to take note of the women on offer. Their choice of devdaasi would stay with them for a short period of time, during which she had no claim to their name or property. Any child that resulted from the brief union would effectively be fatherless and grow up only with the devdaasi mother`s identity. Once a woman was caste off by a man, she was ``impure goods`` for other men of his status. She would then be snapped up by someone of a lesser standing, and in this way her market value would continue to diminish until even a poor man would dare to darken her doorsteps.

Old age was a curse. Once their bodies ceased to be a marketable commodity and they lost their ability to dance, the temples had no further use of them and they had to live off the pity of the town folk. Covered in lice and a den of sexual disease, they would ultimately die in street corners of starvation and ill-health. Their daughters however would continue their tradition. A devdaasi`s daughter was always a devdaasi.

Exploitation of these women came to a head during festivals, when different god and goddesses would be feted. As recently as in 1987, a festival called `Okali` was in existence, when a group of young boys would collect around a pool of coloured water in front of the temple. All the devdaasis in the town would stand in a line in front of them, and each would receive a sari, a blouse and flower garland. After that, buckets of the coloured water would be poured on their semi-transparent white clothes, which would render them virtually naked. Amid much hilarity, the boys would play with the women`s bodies, stopping just short of sexual intercourse in open view of the public. Another custom, which was banned by the government around the same time, was the `Sidi Attu`. A devdaasi would be suspended by a hook attached to a vertical pole planted in the ground. The hook would rotate and she would salute to the gathering with her garments flying - her lower body in open view for the enjoyment of the crowd. The little exhibition supposedly brought prosperity to the town, and after receiving a sari, a blouse, a coconut and a betel nut, the devdaasi would thank the gathering profusely for her good fortune.

The cult of devdaasis is on the brink of extinction today. Where there were hundreds of thousands of devdaasis active in several states at one time, only a few hundred now survive. The government has banned the tradition and has succeeded in `saving` a large number of them.

But there have been cases when the devdaasis themselves didn`t want to be saved. Firm believers in reincarnation and conditioned to accept their status as the will of god, many are unwilling to challenge their circumstances.

Fearing the law and NGO interventions, their cult has almost completely gone underground. Initiation ceremonies are now performed secretly without much fanfare at smaller temples or the local priests` residences.

The deity who attracted the maximum number of devdaasis to her temples in southern India was Yellamma or `The Shameless One`. The goddess is still known to ask for at least one female - at times all female members - from each family in the village to become her handmaiden. Boys are also accepted in Yellamma`s name, who after their initiation, function as transvestite prostitutes known as `Jogappas`.

One of the major Yellamma temples is in Saundatti village in the Belgaum district of Karnataka. This temple has been marked by the police, and devdaasi activity has more or less gone underground here. However, everyone - from the vermillion-sellers near the temple to shepherds who frequent the place -- speak of the devdaasis. Come during festival time, they say, and you can see them. They keep their hair loose and wear hardly any clothes. Even as one approaches the temple, the state`s efforts to eradicate the tradition is apparent. Wall-paintings, banners and graffiti urging devotees to help do away with the custom cover every square inch of government buildings.

Journalist Shanta Serbjeet Singh was witness to one of the annual festivals held here, and she writes:

``...Vast, sky-high clouds of turmeric and kumkum [vermillion] hung over all the access roads to the temple...In Saundatti, at the Yellamma shrine, I saw several elderly devdaasis in their 60s and 70s, being grabbed by volunteers of a local NGO group and having their matted hair shorn off forcibly. I saw them weeping and sobbing begging to be let off...Were they offered any compensation, I asked the leader. No, that was not possible because, according to her, it would encourage more women to leave their hair matted. But yes, they were given one sachet of shampoo worth Rs 1.50 each!``

Several non-government organizations, however, are doing good rehabilitation work with devdaasis who have left the profession to cope with life outside her temple world. They are given opportunities to educate themselves and their children, health benefits and information on pregnancy and AIDS. Some social organizations are also giving them a right to housing, with the hope that a permanent residence would improve their chances in the marriage market. But effort is mostly concentrated on helping them become economically independent.

In a few years, perhaps, the cult will be wiped out completely. But the devdaasis will have left behind a rich legacy - in the form of classical Indian dance -- for which the country has given them little credit.

Bharatnatyam, one of the oldest dance forms in India, has its roots in the Dasiattam dance tradition, nurtured and perfected by the temple dancers of Tamil Nadu. In the 1930s, this dying art form was resurrected, taken out of its sheltered existence within the temple walls and given a platform in the public eye.

The Odissi dance form of Orissa, too, developed in temple precincts, where `maharis` (as devdaasis are called in the state) practiced it to please Lord Jagannatha, and passed on the art from generation to generation.

The grace of the devdaasi`s dance, their arabesque poses and their various feminine preoccupations have been frozen in sculptures on the gates and walls of scores of heritage temples scattered over India -- such as Khajuraho and the famous temple complexes in Tanjore and Chidambaram: full-bosomed, supple-bodied women applying kohl to their eyes, teasing their companion`s hair, feeding birds on their shoulder, removing a thorn from the foot.

In the centuries to come, devdaasis can only hope to be remembered through carvings such as these. In a land where divine presence was perceived in every sexual act, they are little more today than the nation`s dirty secret.

#37 tahmed321

There are several problems in the way GOI & state govts have been addressing the caste issue. While i fully support affirmative action programs (that in theory at least could level the playing field for rich and poor, high caste and low caste), they haven`t helped that much. There is a social aspect and an economic aspect. I grew up in a small village where we did not have plumbing. We had a latrine in the backyard and that`s where we went.

The waste was carried by people from one particular community (related to the gypsies). We paid a fee to the panchayat and they in turn contracted the job out to these folks. There was little else this community could do. They were in a rut, socially and economically. If you wanted to escape that, you sought the anonymity of the big city where the jobs also happened to be.

Migration to urban areas is pretty much the ONLY way you can (still) escape caste oppression. That explains the miles and miles of slums in india`s cities. As you say, addressing rural poverty, improving credit to the poor will go a long way. Even here the dominant castes must not be allowed to run things since social transformation would probably hurt their interests. The government should somehow reach out to the oppressed with alienating everyone else. That`s a vexing problem.

Ref Stuka #: 45

[Harimau: ``yet the only country that gets called upon to apologize over and over again for the caste system is India.``

Yes, I am sure that leads to a lot of heartburn among the oppressed ;)]

Name one country in the world that has an affirmative action program as draconian as India`s. Then you can talk about India not doing enough to demolish caste barriers.

Don`t the Koreans, second- and third-generation citizens of Japan, face discrimination based on ethnicity? Don`t the leatherworkers in Japan get treated as Untouchables with nobody outside their own clan willing to marry them?

Is there no caste in Nepal, Bangladesh, Pakistan, or Sri Lanka?

Do or don`t blacks face subtle discrimination in the US even today? What is the affirmation action quota for Blacks in the US? And didn`t Reagan & Co do their best to destroy whatever little the minorities got under the affirmative action program?

Isn`t it a known fact that the University of California system had a ceiling on the number of Asians it would admit ``in order to maintain broad representation of persons of all ethnic backgrounds`` while simultaneously denying Blacks the seats they previously had under the affirmative action program? Isn`t it known widely that if the UC system admitted students entirely on merit, the Chinese, the Vietnamese and the Indians would completely dominate the universities with whites hard-pressed to get even 5% of the seats?

As for the oppressed of India, what are people like Radha Bathran doing for their community? What do they want, 100% of the jobs and seats in colleges? Will it remove the poverty of those who are in India`s villages?

I had a brahmin classmate whose mother worked as a cook or helped grind batter for iddly and dosa -- in the days before your Sumeet mixies, so I am talking about sitting on the floor and moving the grinding stone by hand for an hour or more. So long as Radha Bathran thinks that her mother`s selling fruit on the streets or her father`s manual labor was demeaning, you have got the perfect recipe for creating a bunch of people whose entire aspiration in life is to get an office job. That is it: a job, not that they intend to do any meaningful work.

With all the affirmative action programs in place since the Constitution came into effect in 1950, have these ``quota candidates`` produced one scientist of world class? Even those Indians who earned their Nobel prizes in the last few years for their work in Western universities cannot claim a single ``quotawallah`` amongst them. What is preventing these quotawallahs from doing their best?

The most moving dedication I saw read, ``This book is dedicated to the memory of my father who did not live to see his dream of his son matriculating from high school.`` The son had gone on to earn a PhD, was a professor in the US and had written a textbook in his specialized field. Did this person have a role model in his family that inspired him to get a PhD? After all, all that his father had dreamed of was that his son would be able to complete high school.

Why can`t Radha Bathran get into public health, rural development or saome such field where she could help her people? No, she has to study journalism so that she can preach her hatred.

Fcuk these whiners!

[Seriously, you sound like Hamid Gul sometimes.]

Listen, I am not quoting Manusmriti and saying these people are paying for their sins from a past life. I fully acknowledge that they have severe handicaps in society. But let us not permit these people to sponge off of society for the rest of their lives for the sins of a previous generation.

re: harimau #36

``Caste is prevalent in all South Asian nations. Buddhist Sri Lanka has its Untouchables; Islamic Pakistan has its chamars; yet the only country that gets called upon to apologize over and over again for the caste system is India.``

..screw everyone else, let us fix our problem...having lived mostly in large cities in india, i have never witnessed this problem, but i know it exists in rural and low literacy rate areas...it is no worse than america`s problem with racism...it is improving and it is illegal but it still happens...can`t pretend its not there, nor does it help to blow it out of proportion...

While hoping for the best, I remain skeptical of President`s Musharraf`s offer of a return to democracy in 10 months. This article from The Friday Times indicates that the elections may be rigged to keep `undesirable` political opinions out of contention:

http://www.thefridaytimes.com/news5.htm

So what is new. This is our shamefull history which most of us are proud too. But look at we Muslims have done. We became Muslim and caried this cancer of pre-Islamic time into Islam. How many of us will associate with cleaning person if they are self proclaimed Gentry ``Shurfa``?

I am afraid you are just showing the problem. We need the the plan for solution. Do more research.

Learn the history of Islam and see how this disease has been eliminated.

http://www.hrw.org/backgrounder/asia/india-bck1121.htm

Caste Discrimination

Dalits throughout India, some 160 million people, are denied their basic civil rights because of their ranks as ``untouchables`` at the bottom of India`s caste system. Dalits are discriminated against, denied access to land, forced to work in degrading conditions, and routinely abused at the hands of the police and of higher-caste groups that enjoy the state`s protection. In what has been called India`s ``hidden apartheid,`` entire villages in many Indian states remain completely segregated by caste.

In its annual Human Rights Report the European Parliament called upon the E.U. to investigate the extent to which its policies “contribute to the abolition of caste discrimination and the practice of untouchability in India” and “to formulate strategies to counter the widespread practice [of caste discrimination].” It also called upon the E.U. and its member states to ensure that caste discrimination was included in the final declaration of the World Conference Against Racism. A subsequent parliamentary resolution expressed regret that the final declaration failed to highlight caste discrimination. This despite the fact that a parallel meeting of the Inter-Parliamentary Union in Durban included reference to discrimination on the basis of work and descent, or caste, in its final declaration.

We ask that you urge the Indian government to seek international cooperation and assistance in tackling the very immense and important task of combating caste-based violence and discrimination. In particular, we hope that you will urge that government to take the following steps:

Implement measures designed to ensure that states abolish the practice of “untouchability,” in compliance with Article 17 of India’s constitution.

Ensure strict implementation of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989, including the establishment of special courts and special prosecutors in each revenue district.

Invite the Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance to visit India.

TAhmed: Your post is excellent, and really the only credible solution. The talk about caste based discrimination is irritating to me coz like Hamzad Afaqui said, poverty knows no barriers, and the the starvation of a Bamman is no different from a Scheduled Caste.

Personal Experience: I am not a Bamman or a Chuda. In Between Khatri. My cook in Delhi was a low caste guy and the mali was a Brahmin. That in itself is a reversal of caste and profession reversals. Both were equally poor. Yet, it was the cook`s son who got a loader`s job in Air Force, and not the other chaps. That is blatant reverse discrimination. The sons are being punished for the sins of the father.

Harimau: ``yet the only country that gets called upon to apologize over and over again for the caste system is India.``

Yes, I am sure that leads to a lot of heartburn among the oppressed ;) Seriously, you sound like Hamid Gul sometimes.

Kiran

[For a nation progressing well, it seems to be ignoring this core problem for a long time now, hope someone, somewhere, can actually make a change regarding this matter}

- India is not ignoring this issue.

Karzai very much U.S.-Pak choice to head Afghan Northern Alliance under reign.



KARZAI CUISINE CONNECTION TO US



FROM K.P. NAYAR



Washington, Dec. 6:

The only certainty about the new power sharing agreement hammered out among the four Afghan factions in Bonn yesterday is that it will restore custom and respectability to Afghan cuisine in the US.

The family of Hamid Karzai, who will take over the reins of the interim Afghan government on December 22, owns a network of Afghan restaurants in Chicago, San Francisco, Boston and Baltimore. For those Indians like this correspondent, who saw their favourite Afghan restaurants here close down because of an American reluctance to patronise them after September 11, the elevation of Karzai with US backing is, therefore, welcome.

In this country, where marketing is the essence of succesful business, the Karzai family of entrepreneurs is certain to spread the word that Afghan cuisine, especially in the Karzai food chain, is not to be equated any longer with the distasteful menu which the Taliban has served the world.

But there is more to Karzai’s surprising choice than food. Sources familiar with the UN-brokered peace process in Bonn say the US and Pakistan worked secretly together to elevate Karzai to the top of the interim administration in Kabul.

He is the best bet they had. Karzai’s connections with the CIA go back to the time he met the agency’s director William Casey in Pakistan to fashion the Afghan resistance to Soviet forces in Kabul. The US ambassador to Pakistan during those eventful years, Robert Oakley, who functioned like a Viceroy in Islamabad when the Soviets were in Kabul, is known to have been one of Karzai’s mentors.

Akhtar Abdul Rahman Khan, director of Pakistan’s ISI during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, was also one of Karzai’s early patrons. Khan spotted the young Pushtoon, then in his twenties, and groomed him into a leadership position within the anti-Soviet resistance.

Karzai’s brothers and several of his family members are permanent residents of the US.

Now that he has been elevated to leadership in Kabul, it is unlikely that anyone will know for sure if Karzai is himself a green card holder. What is known, however, is that the Karzai family owns houses in Quetta, Islamabad and Peshawar in Pakistan.

Clues to the new leader’s mindset can probably found in the fact he has spent more years in Pakistan than in Kandahar, where he comes from.

Karzai is fluent in both Urdu and English, the languages of two powers seeking to influence post-Talibaan politics in Afghanistan. Intelligence sources who have been tracking Karzai say he is not obsessed with the Muslim custom of offering prayers five times a day. Nor does he fast year after year during Ramazan.

For many Americans in the decision-making process here, whose view of Afghanistan is simplistic, this made Karzai a better choice than others who were seen as more dogmatic.

Islamabad, which would have undermined anyone else in the top job in Kabul, is happy with the choice of the new leader.

If Pakistan too had joined Dostum and Gailani in rejecting the Bonn accord, it would have been a non-starter.

The friendship between Karzai and the ISI was, however, strained two years ago when the Taliban’s assassins killed Karzai’s father, a leader in his own right, outside the family’s home in Quetta.

In the complex world of Afghanistan’s blood feud, Karzai is said to harbour the belief that the ISI, to say the least, did nothing to stop the Taliban from killing his father.

Gen. Pervez Musharraf has done everything possible since September 11 to allay such fears within the Karzai clan and has thrown his full weight behind the Pashtoon leader whose support has been crucial in the US-led military campaign against the Taliban in southern Afghanistan.

Asfand:

``Problems that exist today with Hinduism are THEIR problem not ours and let THEM deal with it.``

Oppression is everyone`s problem.

``Allah has rewarded you with the might of the pen. So use it to create unity among Muslims.``

What a colossal waste of time. How many millions are sitting in mosques waiting for some great unifier? Can they really find nothing better in life then Islamic unification?

Zafar #40
``but there is currently more political incentive for the Government to fail to enforce them (or enforce them sporadically and selectively) than there is for them to be fully implemented.``


``What kind of pressure could be brought to remedy this situation?`` ``If the pressure was external would it (in the long run) be beneficial (since we are a xenophobic lot at heart)?``

Zafar, I am `handicapped` because my `caste`experience has been all in Kerala, which had Sri Narayana Guru, the Vaikom Satyagraha, the Temple Entry proclaimation all before Independence if I am not mistaken and a many other measures instituted by goernments since. I was not even aware in my class/friends who was or wasnot SC/ST, actually.

I really believe that its a case of `the spirit is willing but flesh is weak` elsewhere in the country, though as I said I might be mistaken. I agree with Prem that the term Dalit is a sort of manifestation of anger. I believe exerting external leverage would only serve to heighten the anger and negativity in this situation.

For instance, if caste discrimination is termed racism and linked with all instances of racism in the world and used as a stick to beat Indians in general, then a constituency will be created in India which will term all affirmative action as reverse racism. I donot think we can dispense with affirmative action yet. People pointing out look, ``so and so is Dalit and he is at so and so position, so how can you call it racism`` will defeat the whole purpose of emotional/social integration, I think. But the threat of international opprobrium is useful to keep prodding us, I believe. This is just my opinion and I might be wrong.

btw, I wanted to expand on something in my last post. The organised sector of production/services is not growing fast enough to accomodate all the poor, who will remain mostly agricultural or unorganised labor for a long while. Dalits are going to be the most backward among all the landless in the unorganised sector due to their social status and any economic or land reform benefits will reach them last. Land reform `affirmative action` specifically for Dalits needs be thought of as a short cut.

This was a good report Mr. Alam, I hope Radha finds success in her endeavors. India should surely concentrate on this heinous practice of segregating.

For a nation progressing well, it seems to be ignoring this core problem for a long time now, hope someone, somewhere, can actually make a change regarding this matter.

Regards

Kiran