Feb - Mar 2009 INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES 1

Editor EXPERIENCE INTROSPECTION EXPRESSION

insight YOUNG
Anoop Kumar
Editorial Collective
Ranjit T, Sandali, G. Novahu,
Philip Peacock, Ratnesh Kumar,
Dr Ajita Rao, Cynthia Stephen
VOICES
Content Advisors FEB-MAR, 2009 VOL. II NO. 1
Rajesh Katulkar, Havovi Wadia,
Arun Kumar, Braj Ranjan Mani
Foreign Head
Inside Insight
Venkat Morjou Cover Story
Business Head On Suicides, Caste and Higher Education K. P. Girija 9–16
Kishore Chandra
Research
S Venkatesan Voices
Inside Out: On the Scholastic
Student’s Section Regimes of Our Time Azad 4
Aditi Ranjan
Gyanendra Kumar Experiences
Gaurav Himkar Past, Present and Future Rashmi Ekka 5
Foreign Correspondents Our Icon
Saurav Arya Savitribai Phule Ratnesh Kumar 7
Rashmi Ekka Chengara Land Struggle
Insight Representatives Death of a Dream K. K. Koch 18
Lucknow – Yogesh Kumar Struggle for a New Kerala Sunny M. Kapikkad 20
Patna – Satyendra Kumar Caste Discrimination in IIT Delhi
Dhanbad – Subhash Arya IITs: Doing Manu Proud Anoop Kumar 23
Indore – Sevanti
Hyderabad – Parthasarathi M.
Interviews
Mysore – Ashokan Nambiar
With Prof. Anjan Ghosh
Pune – Diksha Neel Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Kolkata Sandali 31–33
Kozhikode – Arun A.
With Suresh Kumar Digumarthi
Ahmedabad – Taranga Sriraman University of Hyderabad Anoop Kumar 39–40
Bhubneshwar – Nizni Hans
Bangalore – Vijay Kumar
Chennai – Sherin Remembering Marichjhapi Massacre, 1979 34
Legal Advisor – Arun Vidyarthi Bihar School Text Books
Cover Design & Illustrations Politics of Syllabus Arun Kumar 35
Rajesh Kumar Manual Scavenging and the Legal Discourse
Magazine Design Through the Lens of Pollution Saptarshi Mandal 41
Rajesh Khurana

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Reports
Caste Violence in Ambedkar Law College 46
The Caste Ailment Strikes the Calcutta Medical College Hostel 47
Celebrating the Birth Anniversary of M C Rajah 48
Celebrating Dalit History Month: Searching for the Past 49
Dalit Leader Files Case Against IIT Madras 51
Court’s Verdict on Khairlanji: No Casteism, No Molestation,
No Rapes; Only Killings 52
ISMU, Dhanbad: Jamadars: 2 out of 2,
Sanitary Inspectors: 0 out of 2 53

2 INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES Feb - Mar 2009

 Editorial

T he year 2008 has been the year of crisis for the country. Right from the unprecedented violence against Christians,
Bihar floods and terror attacks, the country was ravaged both by human-made and natural disasters, losing scores
of lives and suffering huge damage to properties. There were terror attacks in almost all the major cities of the country
and then there was the Mumbai attack that kept the 'whole' country at stand still for almost three days. All these incidents
exposed, in clear terms, the Indian state's insensitivity, inefficiency, and mismanagement during emergency situations. It
also exposed the preferences of Indian elites in qualifying the nature of such incidents. The terror attacks, especially
Mumbai attacks becomes their obsession but not brutal killings and attack on Christians or flood devastation affecting
millions.
However, the New Year brought some good news. Many of our readers might be aware of the case of rustication of
Dalit students from IIT Delhi citing low academic performance as the reason. In the second week of this month, all the
rusticated students were readmitted in IIT Delhi after the court orders. This is one remarkable victory of Dalit students
against one of the most powerful and 'sacred' institutions of the country. Despite suffering for more than six months and
working with very limited resources, the Dalit students were able to hold their grounds and became instrumental in
raising some very important questions regarding the fate of Dalit students in the premier institutions. Recognizing their
struggle and achievement, Insight Editorial Collective is proud to dedicate this issue to all those IIT Dalit students who
chose not to succumb to stereotyping.
Carrying forward the spirit, the cover story of our issue is on the structural tensions faced by Dalit students in Higher
Education- the system that allows the entry of Dalits but takes away all the opportunities to be treated as equal. It is very
unfortunate that to understand this phenomenon, we are forced to map the trajectories of three Dalit students' suicides.
At the risk of being called sensationalist in reading these suicides, we are making some honest efforts to provide a much
more conducive environment in higher education spaces for future Dalit students.
In this issue, we have also covered two stories that reflect on the state's response to demands made by Dalits -
Chengara in Kerala and Marichjhapi in West Bengal. In both the cases, the responses have been swift and clear - the
Dalits of this country are second-class citizens and dispensable. They can live on government doles of welfare measures
but cannot apply their agency and demand decent living. The non-Dalits of Kerala could grab land and later get it
legalized but Dalits of Kerala have no business of demanding a few acres of agricultural land for their living. Similarly, the
West Bengal government would reach out to 'upper' caste refugees but would massacre Dalit refugees asking for the
same treatment. Incidentally, both these responses came from states governed by a communist party that claims to work
for the 'people' and believes that caste is only a superstructure. This is not to say that the earlier governments led by the
Congress (I) were not guilty. In fact, the communists in both the states were taking forward the anti-Dalit policies of the
Congress (I). From both these cases, atleast two things emerge - the state's response differs with the caste of the people
involved - the response being much more brutal in the case of Dalits, with the whole state machinery pitched against
them. On the other hand, the response of the civil society and the media, which maintain complete silence on the state
violence but connive to propagate the justification of the response of the state to the demands made by the Dalits.
The year 2008 was also witness to an event that might have large impact worldwide, in the near future, discounting all
the media hype surrounding that event. One Mr. Barack Hussein Obama got elected to the office of the President of USA
and created enormous curiosity and interest, being the first black to become so. From right before his nomination as
Democratic Party's presidential candidate, till his victory in the elections, the Indian media reported diligently about him
and the US presidential elections. In tune with the strong tendencies of a wannabe superpower, prevalent among certain
sections of the Indian population, parallels were drawn instantly and the search started- who can be India's Obama?!
However, the choices before them were limited to Rahul Gandhi to Narendra Modi, depending on the individual's
ideological leanings. 'Youth' and 'Development' became the sole criterion, as if these were the two qualities that aroused
so much interest in Barack Obama, conveniently forgetting that it was his black skin that was behind this phenomenon.
There were some feeble attempts of reading Obama's victory in the Indian context of the issue of caste. Here, the
dominant tone was that of Obama's effort to distancing himself from his black identity in order to bridge the gap between
the whites and the blacks in America. For us, the message was clear, "In order to join the mainstream, don't raise
uncomfortable questions regarding your identity." Therefore, it was not surprising that the Indian media, while covering
Obama's march, forgot to tell us about the African-Americans' struggle for equal opportunity, about the civil rights
movement, about Rosa Park and Martin Luther King. They want to make us believe that Obama occurred in a vacuum.
In this entire hullabaloo, the important question to ponder over for the Dalits in India is, whether we desire for an Indian
version of Obama at present or we need more and more Rosa Parks and Martin Luther Kings. One popular SMS that went
around after Obama's victory might hold some clue -
"Rosa sat so Martin could walk; Martin walked so Obama could run, Obama ran so your children can fly!"
Feb - Mar 2009 INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES 3

Inside Out
On the Scholastic Regimes of Our Time
by Azad
We never made any big
revolutions,
Just a few mutterings.
Still they were so afraid of us.
We did not even know any survival
strategies.
Still they were so afraid of us.
We, who did not even bother to get
organized!
Who, we?
We who were not looking to come
together.
Shadows scattered here and there.
They knew it so well.
And still they were frightened!
As insecurity took root,
they kept conglomerating.
Now they are busy scripting
new strategies of exclusion.
And to show us that these were not
against us
they included some of us
in their schemes.
Yet we kept falling
from the margins of orkut scraps,
from the frames of mobile pics.
And all the while
they were so careful
to keep our glasses filled!
May be they feel very insecure.
When they were drunk
We saw them, chanting loudly-
Post structuralism
Representation
Embodied subject
Spivak
Lacan
Azad (typicalmalabari@yahoo.com) is an independent researcher based in Mumbai.
4 INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES
Translation from Malayalam by Jenny, Smrti
And thus
many more proposals of exclusion
complete with the necessary
words:
Caste
Religion
Marginalization
Our colours were different
but they sniffed out our castes.
They tagged it with
a nice-sounding political
statement
called inclusive practices.
They owned the whole world.
Every corner was theirs -
Printing press, publishing houses
papers, tv channels, journals.
Yet our feeble voices
and vague shadows
frightened them.
They watched in fear
every move we make.
When resistance thickened,
when questions razed their public
skies,
when voices were raised,
they carefully hid their fears.
And casually told the world
that we were just paranoid.
It was so easy for them,
and they were so convincing!
Thus our words were reduced to
nothing.
Shallow. Superficial. Irrational.
Along with crushed paper cups,
Our unscholarly questions
were thrown into the seminar-
room rubbish-bins.
Voices
Even as we were pushed out,
They were promoting each other
to the power belts
of the academic market.
And we were wearing out.
Many of us lost strength.
Looking for other jobs,
we left!
Those who remained
never came to know about
Seminars, workshops and book
releases.
It dawned on us only then
who we were!
Still we never conducted any
serious debates
among ourselves
about our exclusions.
We never prepared common
agendas.
Wordless
we remained -
Unknown islands!
When pain throttled us
we went in search of those
with the odour and colour of our
caste.
And
as if nothing ever happened,
without showing the slightest
emotion,
they kept on organizing
Workshops, Problematizing the
Issues of Exclusion!
As if
they were doing it for us.
Just for us.
Doing our last rites…
Feb - Mar 2009
 Experiences

Past, Present and Future

I never told anybody who I really was. By
the time I turned 15, nobody asked,
because everyone knew. But they often
'forgot'.

by Rashmi Ekka

W
hat religion do you follow?" asked the curious
twelve years old. "I'm a Christian" I answered,
"A Roman Catholic." She became bolder, "Are you
a Goan or an Anglo-Indian?" "Damn!" I thought. All my life
I've had to answer this question.
Any moment now and she might get to know the truth.
"No, I'm not an Anglo-Indian or a Goan," I said stiffly, "I'm just
a normal Christian."
A stray thought entered my mind and worried me slightly.
"How long will you keep hiding the truth? Or are you hiding
from the truth?" I quickly dismissed it. My secret was still safe.
I breathed a sigh of relief. Though it was not a very big secret.
Many people knew it.
Once in a while someone who didn't know would discover
the truth. I have seen the faces change. I have noticed the
warmth in their behavior disappear. So I never told anybody
who I really was. By the time I turned 15, nobody asked, because
everyone knew. But they often forgot.
In front of me, people would say, "Oh Pramila flunked 5
papers this term, she's really dumb." Another voice would
explain, "She's an Adivasi." And that word said it all. I would
feel like speaking up for Pramila but never did. I walked away.
My secret was that I am an ‘Adivasi’ too.
I grew up with people who believed that Adivasis or
Tribals were slow, secondary and stupid so much so that I
believed them, too. After all, there was no one to challenge that
fact! At home I was told time and again, "Rashmi, you are an
Adivasi. You will never have the brains or the cunning ways of
the others. People will always easily pull you down."
Very kindly but firmly,
At school, I saw almost all, among the very few Adivasi I told her, “I’m a Tribal
students, falling behind in studies. Ma often used to say,
"Tribals always fail. You don't fail my child!" and here at my home
Irritated with all this, I often thought of myself as a non- you won’t be denied
Adivasi and went on to do everything that an Adivasi could
supposedly not do. I excelled inside the classroom and outside. food because you are
I sang, acted in plays, spoke at important occasions and
represented my school in many events. But I had yet to come a Tribal!”
Feb - Mar 2009 INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES 5
to terms with myself.
Living in the city, I hardly ever got the chance to
interact much with my own people. With my own people,
I would be an outsider because I was not like them. But
back with my school friends, I was and remained an Adivasi.
In the spring of 2002, when I was cleaning out papa's
cupboard, I came across a bundle of letters written by
daduji to papa when he was at college. Grandpa had written
about the family history of his previous three generations.
He had written about how his grandfather had been
poisoned to death because he converted to Christianity
and how his mother had lost six of her eleven children in
infancy.
I was crying though these incidents had taken place
years ago. I began to get to know my forefathers intimately.
I realized that I had inherited their will power, their spirit of
good will and their willingness to work hard.
The writer of these letters, my grandpa, died 10 years
back, but his letters still worked their charm. He had once
again reached out to another lost child. That child had
finally found somebody who could be her role model. And
like her role model she wants to make a difference. She
wants to be that one Adivasi, because of who no one
would look down on Adivasis again.
I learnt a lot from the letters. And I was proud, proud
of my forefathers, my people, for the first time. Don't get
me wrong. I have always loved my people and our
beautiful culture. We are the only people who welcome
our guests by washing their feet. I loved my land, too. The
gray hills, the vast stretches of barren paddy fields, the
boiled rice drying in the sun on the road, the Sal trees, the
red tiled roofs precariously balanced on the mud walls. I
loved them all. I loved dancing to the haunting beat of the
Nagara and the Mandar wearing the traditional white and
red sari, singing our Oraon songs and celebrating Sarhul.
But before reading the letter, I had never been proud
of them.
That summer, my friends had come over to work on
a school project. A few of my friends went into the kitchen
to get some snacks. One of the non-tribals, Deepika who
still hadn't got any food said, "Hey! Pass the chips; I am
not an untouchable tribal." Very kindly but firmly, I told
her, "I'm a Tribal and here at my home you won't be denied
food because you are a Tribal!"Ÿ

Rashmi (rashmiekka@gmail.com) has a Bachelor of Arts in Economics and is working for the social empowerment
and economic upliftment of her people.

Themes for next two Issues

Issue Vol II. No. 2 (April-May) - Dalit Movement: Patterns of mobilization.
Since the last 25 years, a strong wave of Dalit consciousness can be felt across the country and has given
birth to numerous Dalit organizations working in different spheres of public life. There are Buddhist organiza-
tions, cultural groups, NGOs, employee associations, political parties and even NRI Dalit associations. All
such organizations reflect a strong aspiration of the community to get organized and fight against caste
discrimination. In the next issue, we aim to explore various patterns that have emerged within the Dalit
movement in context of mobilizing the community through different forms of organizations.
Issue Vol II. No. 3 (June-July) - Caste, Curriculum and Pedagogy
If education has been regarded as means of empowerment for community and of self-actualization for the
individuals, it has also been understood as a site for indoctrination. In this issue of Insight, we aim to explore
the issue of curriculum and pedagogy in our educational system – both school and higher education. We
want to understand how our textbooks and ways of teaching deal with the issue of caste. Firstly, do the
content of textbooks – images and the written texts – reflect the diversity of experiences or particular sym-
bols and experiences are shown as representing All? Secondly, how our textbooks and teachers talk about
caste in the classrooms?
Insight Editorial Collective extends its heartfelt gratitude to Change in Address
the following individuals (fellow Indians from USA) for their Contributors and Subscribers
financial contributions in support of our magazine:– kindly note that we have shifted
Anil Kumar Eravatri Rs 22,000 to new place. Our new address is
Soujanya Dongari & Kumaraswamy Mudide Rs 6500 Insight Young Voices
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Dr. Omar Khalidi Rs 6500 Ph- (011) 40548381

6 INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES Feb - Mar 2009


Savitribai Phule
Awake, Arise and Educate;
Smash Traditions, Liberate
by Ratnesh Kumar
S
avitribai Phule (1831-97) was
wife and companion of
Mahatma Jotiba Phule with
whom she struggled and suffered in
an equal measure but remains
obscure in Indian history due to the
castiest and sexist negligence.
It is indeed a measure of the
ruthlessness of the elite-controlled
knowledge-production that India's
first woman teacher, a radical
exponent of mass and female
education, a champion of women's
liberation, a pioneer in engaged
poetry, a courageous mass leader
who undertook on the forces of caste
and patriarchy is largely a unknown
figure outside the Dalit movement.
Savitribai's role in the anti-caste
and women's struggle is unique. She
emerges as the only woman leader
among all social movements in
nineteenth century India who linked
patriarchy with caste.
She opened her own well for
the untouchables. She started a
women's association, worked for
raising women's consciousness
about their human rights and other
social issues. Being a woman, she
easily recognized the double
downtroddenness of most of the
women as she saw the gender
question in relation to caste and
brahmanical patriarchy.
She campaigned against
Feb - Mar 2009
victimization of widows. She
advocated and encouraged widow
remarriage. She canvassed against
infanticide of 'illegitimate' children.
She went on to organize a successful
barber's strike against the prevailing
practice of shaving of widows' heads.
She did all this taking grave personal
risks.
Many of these misogynistic
practices have now receded in the
background. But in her time, they
tormented and destroyed countless
women. Savitribai's struggle
encouraged and inspired a whole
generation of outstanding
campaigners for gender justice in
Maharashtra - Dr. Anandi Bai Gopal
Joshi, Pandita Ramabai, Tarabai
Shinde, Ramabai Ranade, and many
other have been inspired by her
efforts.
Savitri was still a teenager
when she got involved in the
educational activities with her
husband, playing an equally
important role in founding and
running schools for women and
Dalits, despite the opposition from
the orthodoxy.
On her way to school to teach
girls, often, stones, mud and dirt were
flung at her by those, both men and
women, with orthodox beliefs who
opposed education for women.
She braved this onslaught by
INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES
Our Icon
wearing an old sari to school, and
carried an extra sari to change into
after she reached the school. Finally,
the pressure on her was eased when
she slapped one of her tormentors
on the street.
Once the opponents of female
education realized that the Phule
couple would not easily give in, they
steeped up their opposition. Intense
pressure was brought by the
brahmans on Phule's father,
Govindrao, to convince him that his
son was on the wrong track, that what
he was doing was against the
Dharma.
Finally, things came to head
when Phule's father told him to leave
home in 1849. Savitribai was only 18
and Jotirao was 22 years old when
Joti's father turned them out of their
own home.
Just imagine two young people
in love, taking on the home and world
not for their romance but for
liberating the shackled and the
crushed- with a majestic belief that
every woman, every child and every
man has a right, a divine right, a
natural right, to get educated and to
remake their life. What is more
remarkable, they kept alive this
revolutionary spirit throughout their
lives, setting a benchmark in social
and political engagement that has few
parallels anywhere.
7
 Savitribai Phule was a top
leader of the Satyashodhak Samaj.
She headed the women's wing of the
Samaj and after the death of Mahatma
Phule she assumed the leadership of
the Samaj on the request of many
Satyashodhaks who reposed their
faith in her for her integrity,
commitment and long involvement in
social activism.
She led the Samaj from the front
during the famine and plague epidemic
of 1896-97. She died on March 10
1897, while she was nursing a plague-
affected child. She got infected while
serving the affected people. In her life
and her death, she embodied the
noble and the sublime. Not
grandiloquent words and great ideals
in abstract, but her day-to-day public
life, her suffering with the suffering
people makes her majestic.
Few people know that
Savitribai Phule was a trailblazing
poet of modern Marathi and an
intensely committed writer. Her
writings give the impression of an
ignited mind that wanted to kindle a
similar spirit in other people's lives.
She edited for publication, four of
Jotiba's speeches on Indian History.
A few of her own speeches were
published in 1892. Savitribai's
correspondence is also remarkable
because they give us an insight into
her life and into women's experiences
of the time.
In her essay Karz (Debt), she
condemned the idea of celebrating
festivals by borrowing money and
thus being burdened by heavy debts.
She also wrote on addiction,
explaining how it ruined the lives of
the addicted and their families-
themes that are still relevant in the
21st centuriesŸ
Ratnesh (ratnesh.katulkar@gmail.com)
is pursuing PhD from Babasaheb
Ambedkar National Institute of
Social Studies, Mhow, Indore
Poems by Savitribai Phule
Translation from Marathi: Sunil Sardar, Victor Paul
Mother English
Rule of Peshwa is gone Mother's footfall.
Mother English has come. Brahman's rule is now in
Forlorn and dark our ashes
hopelessness Under the English whips and
Ominous fears of heaven and lashes.
abyss. It is all for the good of the
In such a dismal time of ours poor
Manu's dead at English
Come Mother English, this is
Mother's door.
your hour.
Knowledge is poor man's
Throw off the yoke of refuge and shade
redundant belief
It's akin to comfort mother-
Break open the door, walk out made.
in relief.
In English rule we've found
Learn to read and write, O my our joy
dear one
Bad days gone, Mother
Opportune times! Mother English abhoy!
English has come.
English is the inheritance of
Manu's ways are evil and none
mean
Persian, Brahman, Yemeni or
Poor and depressed we have Hun.
all been.
We have true Indian blood in
They've cheated, befooled, our veins
looted us all Cry out aloud! And shout!
They've gone with English Mother English is OUT!
Go, Get Education
Be self-reliant, be industrious End misery of the oppressed
Work-gather wisdom and and forsaken.
riches.
All gets lost without You've got a golden chance to
knowledge learn
We become animals without So learn and break the chains
wisdom. of caste.
Sit idle no more, go, get Throw away the brahman's
education scriptures fast.
Reference:– Braj Ranjan Mani & Pamela Sardar (ed)‘A Forgotten
Liberator: The Life and Struggle of Savitribai Phule’ , 2008

8 INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES Feb - Mar 2009

 Cover Story

On Suicides, Caste and Higher

Education
No suicide can perhaps be seen only as a result of ‘personal frustrations’,least of all, Dalit student suicides.
These personal frustrations have visible connections with the context around them. They are political,
cultural and social and therefore need special attention. Hence it becomes important for all concerned to
analyze whether these suicides were intrinsically connected to the power structure of the higher educational
institutions and the entry of Dalits into it.

by K. P. Girija

R
ejani S. Anand, a Malayalee
student of Institute of Human
Resource Development
(IHRD) Engineering College at Adoor
in south Kerala committed suicide on
22nd July 2004.
Senthil Kumar, a Tamil student
hailing from an interior region in the
state, admitted for PhD in the School
of Physics, University of Hyderabad,
took his life on 24th February 2008.
Ajay Sree Chandra, a Telugu boy and
an Integrated-PhD scholar at the
Indian Institute of Science (IISc),
Bangalore, committed suicide the year
before, on 27th August 2007.
If one were to look for
similarities that bind these three
disparate incidents, we find that all
were doing courses in Sciences and
admitted to prestigious institutions.
They all were also in the peak of their
youth. Rejani and Ajay were both just
21 years olds at the time of their death.
Senthil was 27. Their youth might
have been mixed with hope and an
equal measure of uncertainty about
their future.
However, the most striking
feature, that binds all these deaths,
would be the caste of the deceased.
All the three students were Dalits.
No suicide can perhaps be seen
only as a result of ‘personal
frustrations’, least of all, Dalit
suicides. These personal frustrations
have visible connections with the
context around them. They are
political, cultural and social and
therefore need special attention.
Hence it becomes important for all
concerned to analyze whether these
suicides were intrinsically connected
to the power structure of the higher
educational institutions and the entry
of Dalits into it.
Death: The Only
Legitimate Protest
Death seems to be the only legitimate
form of protest for the Dalit students
to highlight their discrimination as
well as their right for equal share in
the higher educational sphere. The
'Dalitness' of these students, in the
modern spaces, is yet to acquire a
language to articulate the pain and
the recurrent acts of injustice meted
to them. All the three suicides can be
read as statements of protest against
the insensitivity of various
institutions and discrimination being
practiced there. Still, there had been
a tendency to depict these deaths as
acts of desperation (of course,
personal) of the students and their
inability to cope with advanced
studies, especially in the Sciences.
One can see the clear-cut trajectories
of these students' lives, which lead
to personal desperations and
suicides. Could we assess all these
as something that happened without
any intervention from the world they
were situated in?

Feb - Mar 2009 INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES 9

 From Hope to Death

Rejani. S. Anand, Age 21, Engineering Student

IHRDE College, Adoor, Kerala

Rejani. S. Anand was a student of Institute of Human Resource

Development Engineering (IHRDE) College at Adoor in south Kerala . She
got admission on 6.11.2002 in the government quota seat under merit. The
Scheduled Caste (SC) Department had remitted her fee. On 22nd July 2004,
she committed suicide by jumping from the seventh floor of the Office of
the Entrance Commissioner (Medical and Engineering courses) at
Trivandrum. The sequence of events that could show the immediate
trajectory that led her to take her own life is as follows -
Since her college had no hostel facilities, Rejani was
staying in a nearby N.S.S (Nair Service Society) hostel. Her gender and caste together played
The government had been paying an amount of Rs 315 as an important role towards the denial
a monthly stipend to the SC students that was not of the bank loan
sufficient for Rejani to meet her hostel fee of RS 1000
apart from transportation charges, cost of books etc. Her father was a daily wages labourer and was unable to
support her education. Rejani and her parents tried to get a Bank loan to meet her essential financial requirements.
She first went to Indian Oversees Bank (Puzhanadu branch) for the educational loan. The bank manager was
reluctant even to give the application form. Then Rejani and her mother went to the local M.L.A. Thampanur
Ravi and asked him to intervene. Then only the application form was given to her. When she presented the
application for loan in the bank, she was told to come after two weeks.
Later, Rejani together with her mother went to the bank for more than 20 times to enquire about the status of her
educational loan application. Finally, she was told that she was not eligible for an educational loan. Her family
had no property other than their 2.5 cent land and a hut, and that was not valuable enough for the bank to
sanction an educational loan.
It seems that her gender and caste together played an important role towards this denial of the bank. In Kerala,
a woman going to a bank without her father, brother or husband would be treated with scant attention. Rejani
could not afford to take her father along for the necessary ‘respectability’. Her father was a labourer and his
daily wages were essential for the family. She had applied for an educational loan, which does not require
surety legally. According to the Reserve Bank of India's circular on the educational loans - any merit candidate
could avail herself a loan of up to Rs 4 lakhs for one course without furnishing security and without accruing
interest on the loan until she gets employment.
Here the non-secured 'future' of a Dalit woman might be an obstacle for the bank manager to sanction loan. As
a woman, there was no guarantee that Rejani would complete the course; she might have dropped her study if
she would get married. As a Dalit girl, there was no guarantee to get a good job even after the completion of the
course. These points might be bothering the non-Dalit manager and in that case, how can a bank grant the
educational loan?
Afterwards, Rejani went to the State Bank of Travancore but here also she was denied the loan. Then her
parents approached Thampanur Ravi (the local MLA) for financial assistance. Though he immediately made
the promise but never bothered to fulfill it. They went to the Block Panchayat for assistance but were told that
it had no such financial assistance programme and funds. They went to Pazhavangadi Scheduled Caste office
but were returned empty handed.
She could not go to her college for more than two months as her hostel authorities were threatening her to
deposit the hostel fees. The last straw seems to be the apparent denial of Transfer Certificate (T.C) from Adoor
Engineering College due to the non-payment of the fees. Rejani had got a chance to join Mary Matha College,
which had promised her free education and lodging. When she approached her college for a T.C, they sent her
off to pay the dues. She was sent to the Entrance (Engineering and Medical courses) commissioner's office. It
is here that she committed suicide by jumping out from the seventh floor of that building.

10 INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES Feb - Mar 2009


When alive, not one of them
could politicize their experiences of
discrimination and raise it at a macro-
level. Yet, all of them would have
experienced caste in its micro
formations. The fact that Rejani's
primary confidant with whom she
shared her humiliations seems to be
a woman friend who happens to be a
Dalit is crucial. In his diary Ajay writes
about "superiority/inferiority" gazes,
which unsettle him in his laboratory,
clearly suggesting caste humiliations.
Senthil was part of Ambedkar
Students' Association, a Dalit
students' political forum in the
University of Hyderabad and might
not have been a stranger to the caste
debates and its theoretical
formulations.
Yet, none of them could raise
the issue at a collective level. The
structure, which accommodated them
within it, did it only as a
‘compensatory allowance’. While it
provided representation, it definitely
When alive, not one of them could politicize their
experiences of discrimination and raise it at a macro-level
did not provide dignified
representation and no space to ask
for it, either. Thus, while alive, none
of them could raise the issue of caste
and discrimination in a way it would
be heard. It is tragic that only death
could bring out the discrimination
towards the 'Dalitness' of a student
in all three cases.
‘Dalitness’ in Modern
Spaces
How did these students experience
their ‘Dalitness?’ A short examination
of the immediate incidents just before
their deaths is all that we have. (In
Ajay’s case we hardly have that also).
The often threatening phone
calls received at Rejani's neighbor's
house by her or her parents from the
N.S.S. hostel, to whom she owed her
Feb - Mar 2009
Photo Courtesy The Hindu
End of Hope: Senthil’s Parents at their House
fee dues, are not sufficient enough
to unwrap the caste discrimination.
The continuous journey to one
particular bank more than twenty
times for getting an educational loan
to which she was officially entitled
by Reserve Bank of India order -
neither is this enough to prove the
denial of a loan to a Dalit student.
[From the statements of K.
Santhakumari, Mother of Rejani,
given before Justice Khalid
Commission on 14.05.2005]
Yet, we know that the Bank
would have denied her loan precisely
because of her status as both Dalit
and woman though it was not hinted
anywhere except in the tedious
procedural approach. As a woman,
the Bank would not be convinced
that she would take up a career. They
might not have been confident of her
completing her course at all. Also,
her coming to the Bank alone or
sometimes accompanied only by
another woman, her mother, might
have destroyed her image as a
‘respectable’ woman. As a Dalit, they
would not have read her as
‘meritorious’ enough to gain
employment even after the
completion of the course and therefore
INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES
Cover Story
loan worthy.
Due to her Dalit womanhood,
the student life of Rejani seems to
have become an endless knocking at
various doors for financial support.
The last straw seems to be the
apparent denial of Transfer Certificate
(T.C) from Adoor Engineering
College. Rejani had got a chance to
join Mary Matha College, which had
promised her free education and
lodging. When she approached her
college for a T.C, they sent her off
to pay the dues.
She was sent to the Entrance
(Engineering and Medical courses)
examiner's office. It is here that she
committed suicide by jumping out
from the seventh floor of that
building. Through the dramatic
choosing of the place of her death,
i.e. the Entrance examiner's office, the
act was charged with layers of
symbolic meanings.
She, a Dalit, had gained her
‘entry’ into the system by that
impossible feat of passing the exam
without attending formal coaching
classes. Yet, that entry functioned as
'provisional' for her. In fact, with her
death, we realize what Rejani would
have constantly heard from the
system that apparently gave her
entry: "No Entry for Trespassers."
When Rejani was alive, neither
she nor the students union or caste
11
 The Culprit behind Senthil's Suicide

Senthil Kumar, Age 27, PhD Student

University of Hyderabad
In 2007, Senthil Kumar came all the way to University of Hyderabad,
from a village of Salem district in Tamilnadu. He was admitted for his
PhD in the School of Physics. He belonged to the panniandi caste,
which is traditionally involved in pig rearing and is at the bottom of the
caste-hierarchy. Both his parents are illiterate and are devoid of regular
income. He was the only person in his family as well as in his caste to
register for PhD. After completing his M.Phil from the Pondicherry
University, he had to discontinue his studies for quite some time due to
financial constraints. Since his graduation days, Senthil had been
supporting his parents through his scholarships.
On 24th February 2008, just after one year of his admission, Senthil
Kumar committed suicide in his hostel room. University authorities
immediately claimed that he had died of cardiac arrest. But the post-
mortem report gave the cause of death as poisoning. Surprisingly, this
report was kept as a secret until the Dalit students started demanding an enquiry and compensation for his
family. After the political intervention from the Tamilnadu M.L.A. Ravikumar, the University of Hyderabad had
appointed an internal fact finding committee under Prof Vinod Pavarala.
From the batch of 2007, Senthil was the only student who has not been assigned a supervisor till his death. In
this batch, initially four students had not been assigned a supervisor. Out of these four students, two eventually
left the programme as dropouts and one got allotted a supervisor. Obviously, all the four students were from the
reserved categories. Does it mean something? Was it an evidence of the inability of the School of Physics to
accommodate the Dalit students in its culture of hierarchy?
Senthil failed in one of the four required courses. He failed the same course in the supplementary exam in
January 2008 also. He had the provision of writing the exam again in March to clear this backlog. The students
with backlogs, stop receiving fellowships as per the University of Hyderabad guidelines.
Hailing from a poor family, the University fellowship was the only source for him to support his family and his
own survival. The University changed the rule of curtailing the fellowship to the students who had to clear the
backlogs, a week before Senthil's death, but did not make it public. Prof Pavarala committee made very clear in
its report that, "All the Physics students that this Committee could meet have reported their sense that the
School was acting against the interests of the SC/ST students."
Still, there is no culprit who led to the suicide of Senthil Kumar!

organizations could bring out any of
these exasperating processes as valid
points of discrimination. There might
have been protests at a personal level
in a minimal way. More than
protesting, Rejani had desperately
tried her maximum to obtain a loan in
order to cope with the situation, to
continue her education, her only
hope for a better future.
As far as Senthil was
concerned, when he was alive, he
could not point out the discrimination
in the Physics department, which
denied him a supervisor. This inability
to politically voice his concern
happens even though he was an
active member of the Ambedkar
Students' Association. Failure in a
subject in his course work was the
determinant of his merit. Through his
death, Senthil can be seen to raise
doubts about the acceptance of Dalit
students into the Science
departments. He evokes questions
through his death on the formal
acceptance of Dalit students in the
higher academic studies and its true
spirit.
The ‘logic’, ‘rationality’, and
the ‘merit’ that Science claims for
itself need to be questioned if the
entry of a Dalit student creates so
many ruffles within the system. The
structure of the Science discipline
was such that Senthil himself, at some
point might have believed that he was
not competent and meritorious at all
to survive in the discipline.
The details of Ajay's case are
not known. Yet, his dairy notes and
his status as a student who got

12 INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES Feb - Mar 2009


twelfth rank in the All India Entrance,
yet admitted to the institute as a
reservation candidate, would have
posed problems of the same
Dalithood for him also.
These Dalit students, or their
existence and day-to-day
encountering with their Dalitness
(this is not as direct expressions of
ritual untouchability, but denying
access through new meanings of
merit, untimely payment of dues,
failure in many subjects/course work
etc.) was something that could not
be translated into a political process
for agitation or bargaining for justice,
when they were alive. Paradoxically,
and tragically, the value of their death
is much more than the value of their
life to raise the various nuances of
institutionalized casteism. As if death
is the only elucidation to legitimize
the worth of their life!
Refusal to Accept the Direct
Meaning of their Deaths
There were instances to subvert the
political reasons behind these
suicides. For e.g., when Rejani
committed suicide, there had been a
demand to test the virginity of the
girl. Lack of virginity, which pointed
to the patriarchal world that she was
not quite ‘moral’, was accepted as an
overriding factor for a woman to
commit suicide. But the fact of caste-
based harassment staring right into
everyone's face was not accepted or
seen as one. Also, it is strange that
one was not thinking of analytically
combining these factors - sexuality
and caste. Sexuality, like many other
categories, can manifest only in the
context of other structures like caste.
Her lack of virginity, as revealed in
the test, assumes the primary
importance in comparison to the
Dalits have the right to enter the system through reservation, a ‘compensatory
discrimination.’ Yet, they do not have the right to be treated as equal with the
mainstream representatives of the system in all terms and in all situations
Feb - Mar 2009
obviously biased treatment from all
corners that she knocked for help.
Gender (together with her Dalitness)
has played the role here as if her
‘immorality’ took away her right to
protest against the caste-biased
nature of the educational structure.
Similarly, the University of
Hyderabad authorities maintained,
even before the post-mortem
examination, that Senthil died of a
heart attack. The SC/ST employees
had to invoke the Right to
Information Act to get the post
mortem report, which stated
poisoning as the cause of Senthil’s
death. Ajay's father never got to
know why his son committed suicide,
when he went to Bangalore to collect
his body. He had to wait for a whole
month to know the details of the tense
situation faced by his son, in the lab
in IISc, till the IISc SC/ST employees
union took up the issue as one of
caste discrimination.
‘Conditional’ Representation
in Modern Spaces
These cases are examples of how
caste functions in a ‘modern’ space
like the Higher Educational
institution. The structure seems to
apparently include Dalits through
representational measures like
reservations. By this very act of
representation, the system claims its
neutrality to caste. However, this act
of inclusion/representation is coded
within certain conditions that are very
often invisible and built into the so-
called inclusive nature of the system.
Paradoxically, these conditions result
in the exclusion of the Dalit herself.
Dalits have the right to enter
the system through reservation, a
‘compensatory discrimination’. Yet,
they do not have the right to be
INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES
Cover Story
treated as equal with the mainstream
representatives of the system in all
terms and in all situations. There are
various determinants to decide this
equality such as merit, performance,
articulation etc. There is inclusion
through representation and exclusion
through different 'assessment' and
differential approaches.
While the system might claim
credit for the entry of students like
Rejani, Senthil and Ajay and their
very presences might be seen as their
inclusion into the system, we can see
that their subsequent suicides were
also a result of the conditions/
exclusions that this very inclusion
threw up.
Science and the Notion of
Merit
If we measure merit in terms of marks
obtained, all the three students got
very good marks up to their
intermediate courses and began
losing marks (their brilliance/merit)
after joining for the applied science
courses. Does it mean that these
students were not capable enough to
cope with professional courses or
applied science courses? If so, does
it also mean that there is something
wrong in the environment and attitude
(in essence, the structure) of the
professional institutions towards
Dalit students?
Rejani had failed in nine out of
the ten courses in her first semester.
Senthil too had to clear one paper from
his course work, which was
understood as a condition to allot a
supervisor for him and continue his
research in the Physics department.
Ajay had problems to cope in the
laboratory. His diary shows that he
was scared of one or more faculty
members.
13
 Photo Courtesy Tehelka
“Those eyes, they scare me...”

Ajay Sree Chandra, Age 21, Integrated-PhD Student

Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore

On 26th August 2007, Ajay Sree Chandra committed suicide in his hostel
room. Ajay had a middle class background, as his father is a faculty at the
Government Polytechnic College in Hyderabad. He belonged to the madiga
community and hailed from Malipuram village, Nalgonda district of Andhra
Pradesh. Ajay was a second generation literate from a Dalit family and was
‘meritorious’ enough to compete with the normative 'value' of merit. Yet, as
a Dalit he had no choice except to commit suicide!
Ajay was meritorious (in terms of marks secured) enough to get a seat in
IISc in the general quota. He was one of the top twelve in India, to get into
the PhD course in Biological Sciences at IISc, Bangalore. Still he was admitted
in the reserved category. Labels are labels and one could not even
Father of Ajay Sree Chandra
symbolically discard them just because of 'merit'! The diary that Ajay maintained was possibly tampered with at the
time of his death and it is quite probable that this must have happened at the behest of the Institute with the help of
police. The suicide note had disappeared. The only clue of the circumstance that would have led him to commit suicide
is given in his diary where he described the atmosphere of his lab in the following words -
"Those eyes, they scare me, they look with such inferiority/superiority complex @ you. They tell everything (most of
the time). Those eyes scare me …those eyes scares me a lot. My legs are paining …" According to his friends at IISc,
Ajay was undergoing tremendous mental torture by couple of professors, who were non-cooperative and often
humiliated him on caste lines. But according to the Institute, Ajay committed suicide, because of his ‘personal’ stress.
When informed by the IISc authorities, Ajay's father came there to receive the body of his son and at that time he did
not had any clue about caste discrimination. Later, after quite some time, when the SC/ST union from the Institute
informed him of the caste discrimination, he was shocked.
As a middle class student, Ajay had all the tools to be a meritorious student, to compete well with the mainstream
upper caste students. But he failed, as merit is not the percentage of marks one secures, it seems to be the mark of caste
In general, these can be read modern individuals who want to our educational institutions are caste
as the inabilities of the students to become scholars or scientists rather neutral. If at all caste is expressed or
cope with the applied science than bringing their other identities - practiced there in any form, it is
department, which needs ‘talent’ and like that of caste, community or treated as existing only because of
‘hard work’. Yet, it also carries the gender. This rational and logical the insensitivity of certain
hidden meaning of the inability of the frame itself places the subaltern as individuals. In addition, people do not
high skilled department to generate a the 'other' in the science department. believe that there is such a thing as
friendly atmosphere to a group of The attributes of irrationality, illogic ‘institutional casteism’. Therefore the
people who are yet to be familiar with and intolerance are not for the cultural democratic space like an
its language, hierarchy and protocol. mainstream students; those are educational institution will hardly be
Science seems to see itself as reserved for the subaltern questioned until some direct caste
privileging logic and would shun communities. atrocities happen in those spaces.
perspective. Rationality is prioritized Modern Secular Institutions Marginalized individuals also
and this is defined as transcending do not experience the hegemonic
embedded in Caste control of the knowledge over them
individual experiences. With this
logic, students are supposed to be There is a preconceived notion that as discrimination and a structural

14 INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES Feb - Mar 2009


problem. For them, caste is
experienced as an attitudinal problem
- either from department heads,
economical institutions or from
authorities who represent the
institutions.
One could think about the
environment of this higher education
as a space where there is a mingling
of different kinds of students from
different castes and classes and
religions. Irrespective of the caste and
religious identity, anonymity to a
certain extent is possible in these
spaces. Yet, within this anonymity, the
determinants of caste, religion or
region could be 'read' through
language, lack of or command over
English, submissiveness or assertion,
articulation capacities, regional or
urban nature, mode of dress,
complexion etc. In other words, these
determinants of Dalitness or upper
casteness are much more practically
applied than the details in official
records.
Conflict in Dual Representation
Dalit students have to carry the mark
of their community (not in terms of
the name of their jati but in terms of
their Dalitness). They are also modern
individuals in elite higher educational
spaces. In these spaces, they face
humiliations at a very personal,
individual level, yet those very
humiliations happen due to their
Dalitness as a community. None of
the above mentioned students could
communicate their humiliations to
their parents. The parents residing in
faraway places were not able to give
emotional support to their children.
To some extent, the parents were not
aware of the intensity of the
humiliation of the modern spaces.
The humiliation for a Dalit
student comes in the form of lack of
performance or rather lack of merit,
not paying the dues in time etc. It
never comes directly as caste
discrimination. It never acknowledges
itself as the inability of the system to
Feb - Mar 2009
assimilate some social groups. How
to translate these kinds of approaches
into caste discrimination and
communicate it to the parents who
stayed away from the modern
institutions would be another painful
task. It would be difficult for the
children to tell the reality to the
parents very often; whose only hope
would be these kids. In most cases,
the parents/family did not get any hint
of the desperation from the part of
their daughter/son.
Communities could overcome
the humiliations in their togetherness
in sharing and laughing out,
negotiating and sometimes
protesting too. Individuals have their
own limitations to take the burden of
these humiliations. These students
tried to negotiate and struggle their
best, but after a point they couldn't
bear it anymore. Simultaneously, they
were forced to shoulder the dual
identities - that of a modern, educated
individual (as science students,
rational, logical etc) and at the same
time, as a merit less Dalit. The
contradiction was too much for them
to bear. Finally it ends in their
suicides through which they tried to
question or destabilize the structure
in whatever little way they could
through their deaths.
They had all proved that they
were ‘capable’ and ‘meritorious’ for
this very educational system till their
intermediate/degree courses. In that
case, would they ever think about
turning back and do some menial
labour there after coming through the
long 12-15 years of education? In their
aspiration to become modern
educated individuals with better jobs,
they fitted neither in the higher
educational system nor in their
villages. The long and excruciating
journey from a remote village to an
urban secular space lead them to a
nowhere place.
Inherent Structural Tensions
Dalits or tribals have entered the
system mostly through
representational measures like
INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES
Cover Story
reservations. But, this is seen as an
'excessive' presence and hence
'threatening' presence to the system.
That is why a bank manager is
reluctant to sanction a loan to a poor
Dalit girl for her higher education
instead of thinking about the
possibilities to grant it. That is why
the University stopped the
scholarship of Senthil Kumar instead
of formulating a new approach to deal
the situation. (Even though there is
no law of the university which states
that scholarship is connected to
passing or failing in exams).
When the structure has been
destabilized or questioned in a
minimal way (only) through the death
of the Dalit students, immediately it
tries to retain its status quo, often
using compensatory measures. In
Senthil's case, the University had
granted an amount of Rs five lakhs to
Senthil's family. Here, it was the cost
of a Dalit youth's life and hope which
was burnt in a University. Another
'compensation' was the immediate
allotment of guides to two Dalit
students. In Rejani's suicide case, the
State immediately enhanced the
amount of monthly stipend for SC/
ST students from Rs 315 to Rs 1000.
These temporary compensations
or welfare measures would pacify the
troubled situations. It would also help
various institutions to wash their hands
off from the crime of pushing the
students to suicides. Through
compensation or some welfare
measures the institution or the State is
admitting its inability to assure
distributive justice to the subaltern
communities. Through these
compensatory measures it is also trying
to reinstate the status quo by reducing
tensions though temporarily.
I am ending this article with a
poem from an HCU Dalit drop-out,
who has written this in the context of
the suicide of Senthil Kumar. The
poem speaks much more than what I
have tried to peel out from my analysis
of the deaths of the Dalit studentsŸ
15
 An HCU* Dalit Drop-out’s Poem

To Senthil,

I did not know you when you lived.

I seem to know you so well after you have gone.
Did we not walk the same lonely paths?
Paths strewn with little hurtful insults,
some obvious most not-obvious humiliations
designed to erode our self worth,
with the power to shake our confidence in humanity,
in our thinking, in our love for life and our search for
its meaning.
Could we have talked about our shared bewildering
experience,
of hearing a system stealthily tell us that
we are not good enough to seek knowledge?
Today, you have chosen to protest
in a way that only intensifies my pursuits more lonely,
or should I believe that you have instead
opened a channel for the rest of us?
To make public what until now,
is our private pain,
pain delivered to us
by systems meant to deliver knowledge
and uplift mankind

* Hyderabad Central University

– From an HCU Drop-out Dalit

K. P. Girija (girijakp@gmail.com) is pursuing PG Diploma Course in Cultural Studies, Centre for the Study
of Culture and Society, Bangalore. This article was part of the Short Term Fellowship Programme (2007-08)
of Anveshi Research Centre for Women's Studies, Hyderabad.

16 INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES Feb - Mar 2009

 Photo By Ajilal

A glorious chapter in Dalit Movement

Chengara Land Struggle
I
n one of the biggest-ever Dalit uprisings, in the history of post-independent India, more than 20,000
people, demanding land rights for the landless Dalits, Adivasis and other poor, have been fighting
against the combined might of the state, hostile media and the apathetic civil society of otherwise
'enlightened and progressive' Kerala. Since more than 18 months now, 5,000 families, constituting
more than 20,000 people, have been occupying the Harrison Malayalam Pvt Ltd Estate at Chengara in
Pathanamthitta district of South Kerala. They are demanding substantial land reforms, one that includes
Dalits, Adivasis and other landless communities as well. In more concrete terms, they demand 5
acres of cultivable land and Rs. 50,000 to be given to each landless family.
Their struggle, under the banner of Dalit organization Sadhujana Vimochana Samyuktha Vedi (SVSV),
lays bare many bitter truths about the much-touted land reforms in Kerala. By carrying the photos of
Babasaheb Ambedkar and Ayyankali, they are also making some telling statements against the
patronizing attitude of various political groups and their 'monopoly' on people's issues. However, above
all, the Chengara struggle clearly exposes the presence of caste inequalities and discrimination in
Kerala making a big dent on the neo-liberal image of 'God's own country'.
The struggle has been completely non-violent, although repeated attempts have been made at provoking
them into violence by means of physical torture, rapes, starvation and denial of right to proper health
care. Trade Union leaders and goons hired by Harrison Malayalam have imposed an economic blockade
on the Estate land since August 3, 2008, depriving the protestors both food and water. They have even
disallowed entry of outsiders into the Estate land, preventing proper healthcare.
The Left Democratic Front (LDF) government in Kerala led by CPI (M) has yet to acknowledge the
Chengara land struggle and is treating it as law and order situation, not willing to recognize the grass
root, Dalit-led land rights movement. To understand more about the various facets of Chengara
struggle we have included articles by two leading Dalit intellectuals of Kerala - K.K. Koch and Sunny
Kapikkad.

Feb - Mar 2009 INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES 17

Death of a Dream
by K. K. Koch
K. K. Koch is a well-known literary figure and Dalit activist
from Kerala. This is a translation of his article that appeared
in Mathrubhoomi, a Malayalam weekly (April 6-12, 2008).
Jenson Joseph, a PhD scholar, from University of
Hyderabad, has translated it in English.
V. S. Achutanandan, the
Kerala Chief Minister, who came to
the power with the image of a
‘saviour’, has been making
derogatory remarks against Dalits
and Adivasis in the Chengara land
struggle. The latest being his
allegation that the people fighting
for their land rights in Chengara are
leading a ‘luxurious life’.
On the contrary, the people
are suffering from acute poverty
and lack of medical aid. It is the
inherent anti-Dalit mindset of the
CPI (M) that is behind such
responses. The malicious
propaganda, against the ongoing
land struggle in Chengara, carried
out by the Chief Minister Mr. V. S.
Achutanandan together with the
Marxist publications and TV
channels in the state, underlines
this fact.
In 1964, Achutanandan
became very popular as the leader
of agitating agricultural labourers
under the banner of CPI (M). In
Kuttanad and Thrissur, many
labourers lost their lives during
these agitations. Of the 70 people
killed then, 52 were landless Dalits.
However, these agitations helped
Achutanandan to gain the
confidence of the Dalits in Kerala
and their support made him a ‘great’
leader, a ‘saviour’ of Dalit, other
poors and marginalized and finally
the Chief Minister of Kerala in 2006.
It was the resolute support of
the Dalit community that also let
18
Achutanandan overcome the intra-
party bickering before becoming the
Kerala CM. During 2006 Assembly
elections, CPI (M) Polit Bureau denied
him the party ticket for contesting
elections but it was forced to overturn
its decision due to the huge protests
led by the Dalits in favour of
Achutanandan.
According to Kairali and
Kairali People (both Left-owned TV
channels), 67 per cent Dalits voted
for CPI (M) led Left Democratic Front
(LDF) in that elections. The Leftists
also gained lots of mileage together
with Dalit and Adivasi votes by
screening video clips of the police
brutality against agitating Adivasis
(at Muthanga on 19th February 2003)
during the previous Congress led
UDF regime.
However, the euphoria of ‘pro-
Dalit’ and ‘pro-poor’ Achutanandan
becoming Kerala CM was short-lived
and dreams of Dalits in Kerala for
better life were brutally shattered as
the Chengara struggle plainly laid
bare the true nature of Achutanandan,
as well as the innate anti-subaltern/
Dalit nature of the Communist party.
On July 4, 2007, around 300
activists of a Dalit organization
Sadhujana Vimochana Samyuktha
Vedi (SVSV) encroached 6,000 acres
of land owned by Harrison
Malayalam Plantation Ltd. The land
had been taken on lease by Harrison
Ltd. for 99 years from Chengannur
Mundankavu Vanjipuzha Matom. On
expiry of the lease period, the Matom
INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES
had issued eviction notice to the
company. The agitating Dalits, led by
SVSV, are demanding the Kerala
government to confiscate the land,
now illegally held by Harrison, and
distribute it among the landless.
The struggle began by setting
up around 100 plastic huts by the
agitators, in the estate, battling poor
sanitation facilities and scarce
availability of drinking water. Despite
the poor media coverage, soon, a
huge number of landless people from
south and central Kerala gathered at
Chengara, demanding lands for
cultivation. There are now 20,000
people who have built their hut at
Chengara estate and have joined in
the protest. Who are these ‘people’
stepping in the Chengara protest,
paying no heed to the adverse
conditions under which the struggle
is taking place?
Almost 80 per cent of them
belong to Dalit, Dalit Christian
communities, including pulayas,
parayas and kuravas. People from all
other communities (except Brahmins)
as well as Muslims and Christians,
constitute the rest. For the last few
generations, these people were living
in 3, 5 or 10 cent of lands in various
colonies or on the roadsides, from
where they could be evacuated at any
moment.
It was this awful living
conditions, entirely neglected in the
contemporary neo-liberal celebrations
about Kerala, that has made these
people, including women, children
Feb - Mar 2009
and the aged, to enter the site of the
land struggle and become ‘violators’
of the law. It is also a telling statement
on how the much-touted land reforms
of Kerala had bypassed the real
proletariats – Dalits and Adivasis.
The land reforms in Kerala,
initiated on December 8, 1957, by the
first communist government in
Kerala and ‘completed’ on January
1, 1970, with the official abolition of
feudalism, had given land-ownership
only to the non-Dalit tenants who
were middlemen between the
landlords and the labourers. Dalits,
at the bottom of the caste structure,
were given the rights only for
habitation, and were driven to
margins. Sixty five per cent of the land
available for redistribution was
declared as cash-crop farms and was
excluded from the ambit of land
reforms. Moreover, the frequent
modifications introduced in the land
reform Bill made sure that the feudal
land ownerships smoothly transform
to capitalist land ownerships.
The first land reform bill,
introduced in 1957, stated clearly that
50 per cent of the excess land should
go to Scheduled Castes and
Scheduled Tribes. However, a study
by Dr P Sivanandan indicates that
only 30 per cent of the land was given
to them. As a result, according to
official records, almost 85 per cent of
the Kerala’s SC & ST population lives
in 12,500 ‘Harijan’ colonies, 4,082
‘Adivasi’ colonies and on the
roadsides.
Apart from the faulty land
reforms, another major reason for the
ongoing Chengara land struggle is
the issue of (internal) migration -
large-scale internal migration, mostly
by ‘upper’ caste Christians, to areas
like Wayanad, Idukki and Attappadi
happened between 1940s and 70s.
In 1956, the satyagraha led by,
the then prominent Left leader, A K
Gopalan and some major
interventions by Fr Vadakkan,
legalized these internal migrations.
Feb - Mar 2009
Kerala CM VS Achutanandan
Then, Mathew Maniangadan
Committee recommended these
upper-caste migrants to be given
permanent ownership of the land
they had encroached, completely
neglecting its consequences like
deforestation and the large scale
uprooting of Adivasis.
Instead of introspecting about
the failed land reforms and correcting
the historical wrongs, the present
communist government and its
cronies are indulging in vicious
propaganda to discredit the whole
Dalit led land struggle. One of the
main propagandas, against the
protestors, carried out by the
mouthpieces of the ruling Communist
Party is that they own 3, 5 or 10 cent
of lands and houses provided under
People’s Planning Program. When
Dalits argued that this is not the land
ownership but just the right to
habitation, these Left media gave a
very castiest argument that Dalits
cannot have land ownerships outside
the Harijan colonies/ghettoes. And of
course, some of the leaders in this
struggle own small pieces of land. But
if Achutanandan considers this as a
disqualification for them to support
the struggle by the landless, then he
must also denounce those who
supported the land reforms, including
Mr. A. K. Gopalan.
INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES
The agitators at Chengara are
carrying the photos of Ayyankali
and Dr. Ambedkar. In another words,
they are openly rejecting the myth
of ‘patronage’ that dominant
Communist parties like CPI (M) have
always been imposing on Dalits and
Adivasis. It is the racist desire to
bring back the struggles like
Chengara under the Communist
Party’s patronage that has made V S
Achutanandan to denounce the
Chengara land struggle. For them,
Dalits coming together to fight for
their rights, without under
communist leadership, is simply
unimaginable and they are also
aware of their own history of
existence.
The land reform movements,
calling for a fundamental change in
the land ownership, had a significant
role to play in transforming Kerala into
a political society. In 1906, when
Indian National Congress began its
operations in Malabar (now North
Kerala), there existed a powerful
tenancy system that benefited the
rich agriculturists. The Congress
movement declined to address this
tenancy system but the dissident
Congress Socialist Party, out of which
the present Communist Party was
born, took up the issue.
The agricultural labourers’
movements in Malabar played a
major role in helping the Communist
Party grow as a major force in the
region. During this period, one of the
greatest Dalit leaders, Ayyankali was
leading a movement, before the Raja
of Sreemoolam as well as in the public,
demanding ownership of land for
Dalits. At the same time, another great
Dalit leader Poyikayil Appachan was
demanding that the Dalits be given
five acres of land and monetary
support for undertaking agricultural
production.
At the time of Land Reforms
Bill, the Kerala economy relied
heavily on the cultivation of cash
crops. Hence, the argument that the
19
cash crop farms had to be kept out of
the purview of the Bill, in order also
to prevent any development that
would adversely affect the
agricultural labourers, could be
justified. But the situation has
changed now. The cultivation of all
cash crops, other than rubber, has now
become unprofitable. The
government can import any cash
crops at much cheaper rates. The
agricultural labourers have become
jobless as the cash crop farms are
being closed down.
As per the agreement between
the state and the central government,
Struggle for a New Kerala
by Sunny M. Kapikkad
T he ongoing struggle at Chengara
is undoubtedly one of the major
land struggles in Kerala's history. Ten
years back, such a struggle would
have been unthinkable. Ten years
back we all thought that there was no
scope for another land struggle in
Kerala, that there was no land to be
redistributed in Kerala. Even social
activists thought that all the land that
could have been legitimately
redistributed had been exhausted. It
was the Adivasi land struggle in 2001
that revealed to us that this notion
was false and that there is arable land
in Kerala that may be redistributed.
During that struggle, for whole
20
in 1964, the statutory rationing system
was introduced keeping in view the
export of cash crops. But now, since
around 67 per cent of the population
in Kerala falls ‘Above Poverty Line’
(APL), the food distribution system
of the centre has stagnated.
Under these conditions, the lack
of political will to bring the estates
under the purview of land ownership
reforms smacks of a conspiracy to
protect the interests of the land mafia.
(The estate at Cheruvally, which was
given to Harrisons Malayalam Ltd on
lease, was sold to K P Yohannan, an
associate of the company, for Rs 325
Excerpts from the speech
made by leading Dalit
activist Sunny M. Kapikkad,
at a night-vigil organized in
support of the ongoing
Chengara land struggle in
Thiruvananthapuram on
7 March 2008. The speech
has been translated into
English and posted on
http://kafila.org by J.
Devika.
of forty-eight days, the Adivasis laid
siege here, in front of the Secretariat
where we have now gathered, and in
front of the Chief Ministers' House.
Political leaders of both the ruling and
opposition parties were united in
opposing the Adivasi struggle. They
proclaimed that Adivasi leader C K
Janu and her group were being
propped up by funds from abroad!
It is only natural that a political
party thought that way. The parties
may have assets worth crores, but
they lack the ethical will to support
500 people for 48 days in this city. As
someone who had actively
participated in that struggle, I can tell
INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES
crores. The same company also owes
Rs 500 crores as it has failed to pay
the lease amount since last many
years.)
When possibilities of collective
action declined and when autocracy
gained strength in old Soviet Russia,
Vladimir Mayakovky had chosen the
path of suicide to expose the
tyrannical rule of Stalin. Today, the
denial of justice from the neo-czarists,
who rule the present Kerala, stand
exposed and the protestors at
Chengara, including women, children
and the aged, threaten to commit
suicide unless justice is delivered Ÿ
you that it was the Dalit colonies in
Thiruvananthapuram city that made
it possible for the struggle to survive
for so long. It was from these Dalit
colonies that sacks of rice used to
arrive at the cooking shed here. A
jeep used to go around for that
purpose and each Dalit house would
contribute handfuls of rice to make
sacks full. I am saying this because
the Kerala politicians were
proclaiming that the struggle was
supported by foreign hand!
It was this struggle that taught
the people of Kerala that arable land
was indeed available for
redistribution. It is in the context of
this struggle that landless people of
other communities entered the land
struggle at Chengara. However, the
majority of such people happen to be
Dalits and Adivasis. It is something
that needs to be examined historically.
It is not enough to understand
Chengara struggle as merely a
struggle for land by the landless
people.
However may we idealize the
Kerala land reforms, it has been
proved beyond doubt that they failed
Feb - Mar 2009
to distribute lands to some social
groups in Kerala. The crux of the land
reforms that were put forward by the
government in 1957, which were
implemented on 1 January 1970, was
the fixing of ceilings on the amount
of land that a family could possess,
and the promise Photo By Ajilal
that surplus land
would be taken
over by the
government and
redistributed
among the
landless.
However, the
plantation sector
was exempted
from land
ceilings. Once
the plantation
sector was
exempted, all
that was left for
redistribution
were some
paddy lands towards the west, some
lands in the midland areas, and some
fallow fields that belonged to the
Nilambur royal house.
Moreover, the land reforms
actually gave full ownership rights to
tenant cultivators only. The Dalits and
the Adivasis, who could never even
become a tenant within Kerala's
traditional caste system, did not
benefited at all from much-touted
Kerala land reforms. The fact is that
millions of Dalits and Adivasis in
Kerala had to live outside the ambit
of land reform laws.
Many frauds were also
perpetrated as part of the
implementation of the land reforms.
In 1968, the government had
estimated that some 8,75,000 acres of
surplus land would be available for
redistribution. However, till date, the
government has been able to acquire
just 1,24,000 acres. The rest has all
been usurped through underhand
practices. Trusts had been exempted
from ceilings. Overnight, hundreds of
Feb - Mar 2009
trusts were formed in Kerala. Through
creating trusts and registering deeds
in false names and other ways, all this
land was spirited away. Out of the
roughly 1,25,000 acres acquired only
96,000 was redistributed and the
Dalits, the Adivasis, and the coastal
A Graffiti at Chengara
people, did not gain anything, not
even a cent. These are now the people
who have become the focal point in
the struggle like Chengara. It is the
Dalits and the Adivasis who,
historically, have been excluded from
land reforms, that have come forward
with claims upon land today.
We need to take very seriously
the fact that even though this section
of society has waged a struggle since
the past seven months and a half, the
democratic government in Kerala has
not bothered to invite them for talks.
Land has always been a major issue
in Kerala. If there were a dispute over
title deeds in the hilly areas of Kerala
into which migration has taken place
from the plains, both the ruling party
and the opposition would surely pitch
in heavily. It would grow into a fiery
issue. Why is it, then, in this
'politically-enlightened' Kerala that
the powerful lack the democratic
ethics towards responding to
Chengara struggle waged by landless
INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES
people from particular social groups?
Here we need to see deeper. In
a particular part of Kozhikode district,
around 200 families have occupied
some land, and have been staying
there. The High Court of Kerala
ordered their eviction in clear term;
instead, Kerala
government
stepped forward
to protect their
right to stay
through a special
order. There's
something in this.
These people
have occupied
land under orders
from a certain
church in Pala
and belong to
different socio-
e c o n o m i c
background.
Neither the LDF
nor the UDF have
any problems about offering them
protection. But the very same ruling
class would never respond justly in
case of Dalits, Adivasis claiming their
rights.
Our second experience of
state's response towards Dalit and
Adivasi rights comes from
Muthanga. In 2001, the then Chief
Minister, A.K. Antony had signed an
agreement with the struggling
Adivasis that land would be
distributed to them, and that the
constitutional provision for Adivasi
self-government would be
recommended. However, in 2003,
when the Adivasis started agitating
for the implementation of the very
same agreement, this Chief Minister
deployed thousands of policemen
against them, leading to the police
firing on Adivasis, never caring to
find out why the struggle had been
re-kindled. Four days before the
firing, all the four major political
parties held a joint protest in
Wayanad district demanding the
21
eviction of Adivasis from Muthanga.
Now it is very clear for us that this
enlightened Kerala, this Kerala which
is considered the very home of
political alertness, has a legacy of
turning away from the legitimate
demands of Dalits and Adivasis.
Recently the members of the
Chengara Land Struggle Solidarity
Committee (CLSSC) met the Kerala
Chief Minister, Convener of the Left
Democratic Front and the CPM State
Secretary with the demand that the
government should redistribute land
to the struggling families and bring
their struggle to an end. I was a
member of that group. All the three
people told us that ours is not a
genuine struggle but illegal land grab.
They said, "We have plans to give
land to the landless and we will indeed
give. But we will not countenance
your struggle; we will not accept it".
This is a very important
statement for us to ponder over.
Through their land struggles, the
Dalits and Adivasis are trying to
create a dialogue with the Kerala
government and are trying to exercise
collective social agency, within a
democratic society. But the
government is telling us that, "You
aren't social agents. We are here to
do all these things, and we will do
them. This is illegal struggle".
Kerala government is saying
that we have to be evicted because
the occupation of Chengara estate's
land is illegal. In that case, Harrison
Malayalam must figure above us. It
has not paid a pie as rent on the
Chengara Estate since 1994. And so,
the lease agreement is invalid now.
The government, which ought to use
the strong evidence against Harrison
to take back the estate, is accusing
us of illegal occupation!
The same company sold 3500
acres of leased land held by it in the
Cheruvally estate at Kottayam to an
individual for 126 crores; it has sub-
let leased land at an estate in Thrissur.
22
The great Marxist leader EMS Nambutiripad, who owned tens
of thousands of acres of land, could speak for the landless but
his followers could not accept a Dalit, Laha Gopalan, who owns
one and a half acres, to do so
The government's own enquiry
commission discovered that Harrison
had amassed crores this way. Yet the
government's ire is not against such
persistent law-breakers, but against
the struggling landless poor.
The other day, Mr Balan (SC/
ST affairs Minister, Kerala) said that
we should not occupy the land as part
of political action. These people
ought to realize that India itself was
born out of massive civil
disobedience. It can happen only that
way and that is how history is. I do
not claim that we are not breaking the
law. We are indeed the law-breakers.
But he very conveniently forgot that
he represents a movement
(communist) that was born out of the
successive waves of law breaking
initiated by many different groups of
people in Kerala in their fight for
rights.
Another accusation against the
protestors is that these struggling
folks are actually landowners. Laha
Gopalan, the President of the
Sadhujana Vimochana Samyukata
Vedi, has land, they say. Laha is
leading the struggle of landless Dalits
and others. He is not trying to
communicate his domestic wants and
lacks to the government. The great
Marxist leader EMS Nambutiripad,
who owned tens of thousands of
acres of land, could speak for the
landless but his followers could not
accept a Dalit, Laha Gopalan, who
owns one and a half acres, to do so.
This is what I call the Dalit issue.
Finally the government now
says that it will give land only to the
Adivasi. This is a strange defense,
indeed. In 2001, when the Adivasis
were protesting on the streets of this
city for full 48 days, all these
politicians said that they wouldn't be
INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES
given land. Seven years hence, when
all the landless - Dalits, Dalit
Christians, Muslims, and all others -
joined together to struggle for land,
these politicians now say that only
the Adivasis need land. This move is
a well-planned one. By ignoring the
demands of other landless groups
and trying to pit against the Adivasi
claims, the ruling class is trying to
scatter the political action that is
building up at Chengara. But
someday the government will have
to concede; it will have to accept the
claims of these landless groups also.
Today we need such pressure
that will force the government to deal
with the issue democratically, to
redistribute land to the landless
without causing any loss of life. That
is the only way this struggle can
succeed. But today no such pressure
exists. Kerala failed to react to the
terrible state violence at
Moolampally. Now in Chengara
where thousands of people are on the
brink of self-sacrifice Kerala is looking
away. It is hard to be proud of this
Kerala.
We need to see Chengara as a
struggle for a new Kerala, one that
dismantles the old. This new Kerala
would be one in which the social
agency of all marginalized groups
including Dalits and Adivasis are
recognized. A major task has been
initiated at Chengara, one that
exceeds the amount of land the
occupants get. Our actions in
solidarity need to be attentive to this
fact. I end my words, with the plea
that we need to think of the various
forms of activism possible, and that
individuals and organizations should
take them forwardŸ
Feb - Mar 2009
 Caste Discrimination in IIT Delhi

IITs: Doing Manu Proud

The dismal representation of SC/ST students in IITs demands some serious questioning from all who believe
in equal opportunities and social justice. Even after 40 years of their existence, most of the IITs have also
singularly failed to recruit faculties from these communities. On the top of it, there are various instances that
indicate towards the prevalence of caste-based harassment of Dalit students. Recently IIT Delhi was in news
due to the termination of 12 Dalit students together with the allegations of caste-based discrimination. In the
wake of this incident, the author here has tried to map the experiences of Dalit students within IIT Delhi
structure.

by Anoop Kumar

O
n May 2008, 12 Dalit
students (11 SC & 1 ST)
were terminated by the
Indian Institute of Technology (IIT)
Delhi, citing their 'low academic
performance'. Eleven of these
students were from the first two years
of their undergraduate courses. After
receiving the termination letter, some
of these students filed a petition in
the National Commission for the
Scheduled Castes (NCSC), alleging
caste-based harassment in IIT Delhi
and demanded annulment of their
terminations. According to the
students, many IIT Delhi faculty
members harbour deep prejudices
against students admitted through
reservations and they receive very
poor grading despite performing well
in the exams. The NCSC immediately
summoned the Director of IIT Delhi,
and asked him to investigate into
these allegations and also to review
the terminations.
Later, in July first week, the IIT
administration submitted a one-page
report to the NCSC stating that, it has
decided to revoke the expulsion of 2
Dalit students by giving some
relaxations in their grade
requirements. It also informed the
NCSC, about the IIT review
committee, constituted in response to
the summon issued by the NCSC, to
inquire about the prevalence of caste-
based discrimination. The report
further stated that 'no case of caste
discrimination was brought out by the
students in their meeting with the
Review Committee'. The last
paragraph of the report reiterated
that , “'IIT Delhi is very sensitive to
the special needs of SC/ST students
and faculty members spare no efforts
in helping them, and indeed all weak
students, to come up to our higher
academic standards".
However, the Dalit students
countered this report by claiming that
the members of IIT review committee
did not entertain issue of caste
discrimination at all. The members
only inquired about their academic
performances and refused to take up
questions related to the caste
discrimination. Later, the Dalit
students took out two rallies,
demanding the re-admission of
remaining 10 Dalit students and also
sent their representations to the HRD
ministry. As a last resort, some of
these students also filed a case
against IIT in Delhi High Court.
In the first week of this year,
after six months of their continuous
struggle against one of the country's
most powerful institutions, finally
there was some good news. The
court passed an interim order for
readmission of the six Dalit students
and one more Dalit students was
readmitted by IIT administration itself
in the same week. As for now, nine
Dalit students have been readmitted
in IIT Delhi.
IITs and SC/ST Students
Every year, all the seven IITs jointly
conduct an entrance exam,
considered to be one of the toughest,
to select candidates from all over the
country and offer around 5500 seats
for its various undergraduate (B.
Tech and Integrated M. Tech)
courses. IITs are autonomous
institutions under Ministry of Human
Resource Development (HRD) and
are completely funded by the
Government of India. The IITs provide
22.5 % reservation for SC/ST students
as per the constitutional norms.
However, many reports suggest that,
close to half of the total seats
reserved for SCs and STs remain
vacant and that of those admitted, a

Feb - Mar 2009 INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES 23

significant proportion, perhaps up to
25 %, is obliged to drop out. (The IIT
Story: Issues and Concerns',
Frontline, Vol. 20-Issue 03, Feb 01-14,
2003).
Now, if we do some simple
calculations, we can very easily
conclude that the SC/ST community,
on average, looses about 773 under-
graduate seats out of the total 1237
seats reserved for them every year,
due to both, unfilled seats at the time
of admission and subsequent drop
outs. This amounts to a massive loss
of 62 %, every year, of the total
allotted seats for the SC/ST students.
Except IIT Guwahati (founded
in 1994) and IIT Roorkee (included as
IIT in 2001), all the other 5 IITs are at
least 45 years old. I would like my
readers to just imagine the magnitude
of the loss suffered by the SC/ ST
community in all these years and also
to critically analyze the impact of such
losses for the communities, that has
been suffering the inhuman exclusion
in every sphere of their life and whose
only life line has been the provision
of reservations in education and in
government jobs.
Therefore it becomes utmost
important for us to ponder over why
even today, about half of the seats
for SC/ST students remain unfilled in
the IITs at the entrance level and the
reasons for such a high dropout rate.
To many, the obvious answers, for
both the phenomenon, will be that the
SC/ST students are 'weak in studies'.
It means that, on an average, the SC/
ST student cannot compete with
general category students, both in
the entrance exam as well as during
his/her stay at IIT.
Before probing into the
'weakness' of SC/ST students, I would
like to point out that:–
• The cut-off marks at IIT entrance
exam as well as passing marks in
particular subjects in IITs are not
fixed.
24
• The cut-off marks for SC/ST
students in IIT entrance exams, in any
year, are normally 10 % less than the
general category cut-off in that year.
• The IITs follow relative grading in
course work. There is no fixed
minimum passing marks. Even if any
IIT student has scored 60 % in any
particular subject, there are chances
that he/she might be declared failed,
if the average score of other students
is slightly higher. Or he/she might not
be failed, as there are no fixed passing
marks. To pass students, who have
scored less than the average,
becomes the prerogative of individual
faculty members.
I came to know about the
termination of 12 Dalit students from
IIT Delhi in the second week of June.
While interacting with these students
and listening to their stories, I became
aware of how the IIT administration
deals with the Dalit students. To have
a better understanding, I decided to
interact with more Dalit students from
IIT Delhi as well as some of its ex-
students.
While interacting with IIT
Delhi's terminated Dalit students,
three questions came to my mind.
• Were these students 'weak' in
studies and were not able to cope up
with the rigorous studies in IIT Delhi?
• Or/ and did they just didn't apply
themselves and study hard?
• Or were there other factors
involved that might be beyond these
students?
The truth that emerges out is
shocking, to say the least. Dalit
students who are admitted in IITs are
marked as 'weak' and 'non-
meritorious' from the very beginning
and their stay in IITs are made as
painful as possible. Such behaviour
has been institutionalized and has
been perfected into a fine art by many
faculty members.
According to the IIT
INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES
administration, all SC/ST students
entering into the IITs are 'weak', as
they come through reservations (just
refer again to the last paragraph of
IIT review committee report,
mentioned at the beginning of the
present article, that correctly reflects
the IIT administration's assumption
towards the SC/ST students).
Therefore many IIT faculties take it
as their pristine duty, both in the class
and outside, to constantly remind the
students of the fact that 'all general
category students are meritorious
whereas SC/ST students don't
deserve to be in IIT'.
However, the truth is that most
of the Dalit students, entering into
the IITs, are often toppers of their
respective schools. They are, mostly,
second generation literate and hail
from lower-middle class, rural or semi-
urban backgrounds with non-English
medium schooling. In comparison, the
general category students are
invariably from upper-middle class,
urban, upper-caste, and from English
medium schools. Not only are there
marked differences in the
backgrounds of the students from
these two categories but also their
routes to IITs differ immensely. And I
would like to argue that this is where
the 'merit' is constructed.
Construction of 'Merit' via
coaching centres
A recent study conducted by
ASSOCHAM reveals that private
coaching centres, that train students
to crack the entrance exams for the
admission in IITs and other
prestigious engineering colleges,
mint Rs.100 billion ($2.30 billion) a year
- an amount that can fund 30 to 40
new IITs (IIT coaching classes, a Rs
10K crore Industry? The Times of
India, 3rd July 2008). In fact, the city
of Kota in Rajasthan, which boasts
of the best coaching centres in India,
is flocked by aspiring IIT candidates
from all over the country. One
particular coaching centre in Kota, in
Feb - Mar 2009
fact, claims publicly, through its
advertisement, that 1 out of every 4
IITians is their 'product'.
As we all know, these coaching
centres are not cheap at all. On an
average, a student spends more than
Rs. 1 lakh for 8 month coaching
during his/her preparation for IIT
entrance exam. As a response to the
impact of the coaching industry and
the undue advantage that it gives to
their students, IIT has recently made
changes in their admission procedure
by fixing the number of attempts for
IIT aspirants and has done some
modification in the examination
pattern as well. However, these
cosmetic changes have not been able
to restrict the number of students
flocking to the coaching centres.
Now, the question is, who are
those students who flock to these
coaching centres to crack the tough
IIT entrance exams? The answer is
not that difficult if one interacts with
the IIT students. The majority of the
Dalit students have cleared the IIT
JEE exam, through self-study or by
taking private tuitions, as they were
not in the position to pay huge fees
for the coaching centres.
In comparison, it is very rare to
find a general category student, who
had not studied in one or the other
big coaching centres. Due to which,
the general category students are
much better equipped for IIT JEE
exams and this reflects in the merit
list of the general category, which has
higher cut-off marks than SC/ST list.
Still, many SC/ST candidates are able
to score higher and reach to the
general category list. However, the
lower cut-off marks for SC/ST
students, becomes the first indicator
towards the assumption of 'SC/ST
students are weak'.
There is not even a single voice
in our civil society or in the media,
which opposes the coaching centres
and the undue advantage they
provide to the rich, urban, upper-caste
Feb - Mar 2009
students in comparison with those
who, without money, are left to do
self- preparation.
The IIT JEE exam is one of the
toughest exams. Why? 'To attract the
best minds in India' is the stock reply.
If this is so, then what are these
coaching centres, with Rs.100 billion
annual turnovers, doing? They are,
in fact, manufacturing 'best minds'
from those who have deep pockets
in this country and are aiding in the
unequal competition between
students from different backgrounds.
However, nobody wants to
acknowledge this fact, as these
coaching centres are boon for 'upper'
caste families, for they help them in
their claim of being 'meritorious'.
Manufacturing ‘weak’
students as English
language becomes another
marker of ‘Merit’
Majority of the Dalit students,
entering into the IITs, are from the
non-English medium schools,
whereas the medium of instruction in
IITs is English. Once admitted, these
students find it very difficult to follow
the classes taught in English, which
results in their low performance in
initial years, as compared to other
students.
Since all the SC/ST students,
on being admitted in IITs, are already
marked as 'weak', the initial low
performance of non-English medium
Dalit students feeds into this
stereotyping and they easily become
the poster boys of 'quota students'
in the highly prejudiced IIT campus.
A few Dalit students, who are from
relatively better backgrounds (read
English medium) are able to escape
such ignominy, getting an
opportunity to pass off as a general
category student, leaving behind
these hapless students to suffer the
punishment of being 'quota' students.
Instead of acknowledging the
difference in background and the
problem of medium of instruction, the
INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES
IIT faculty members, due to their
castiest prejudices, quickly brand
these students as 'undeserving', 'not
up to the mark' and 'forced into the
IITs through reservation'. Rather than
supporting students to cope up with
English and gradually come at par
with the other students, they are
hostile or at best indifferent to their
plight.
On the pretext of their low
performance in IIT, many faculty
members humiliate and demoralize
these Dalit students, by making
remarks on their academic capabilities
implying, "since you don't deserve
to be here, now you suffer". It is their
way of retaliating to the reservation
provisions, and since they cannot
stop these students from entering into
the IITs, they try to punish these
students for that 'crime'. To counter
reservation provisions, there is a
strong urge to prove that Dalit
students are weak, and what better
way to do it than targeting those who
are already little handicapped in the
IIT environment!
The rigorous IIT schedule from
the day one does not make things
easier for these Dalit students either.
By the time they are in a position to
cope up with the IIT culture and
rigours, they are already under heavy
backlog of many courses and find
themselves on the verge of being
terminated, due to their 'low academic
performances'. Many of these
students, drop out, by the end of their
1st or 2nd year, and those who some
how pass, barely manage to get their
degrees in stipulated 4 years. They
take another 1-2 years to get their B.
Tech degree, their stay being further
marked by demoralization, stigma and
huge alienation.
More than 90 % of the children
in India, those who are fortunate
enough to pass 10th std., do their
schooling in Hindi or other regional
languages as their medium of
instruction. Yet IITs, that claim to be
the institutes of 'national' importance
25
and teach in English, have failed to
develop a proper mechanism to
counter the problems faced by these
students, once admitted in IITs. Is it
due to the incompetence of the IITs
or they are simply not bothered, as
they might believe that the 'best minds
fit for IITs' can only be found in urban,
English-educated, upper caste
students? I believe both reasons to
be true besides it gives them a big
stick to beat the reserve category
students with.
Engineering colleges in India
have copied their entire syllabi from
the knowledge produced in the west.
The faculty members teach from the
western texts and techniques, which
they had learnt from there in the 1960-
70s. The academic research and
development of syllabi is in such a
sorry state in this country, that there
is hardly any innovation in teaching,
both in texts and techniques. Many
IIT professors teach in the class,
through their old notes (known as
kharra in Hindi slang), promoting
only rote learning and discouraging
any discussions in the class.
Apart from their incompetence,
IIT faculty members are also not
interested in developing any
mechanism to resolve the question
of language, as it does not affect their
caste and class interest. The
knowledge of English gives them the
sense of superiority vis-à-vis the
lower caste, which they don't want to
lose at any cost. Like Sanskrit earlier,
now English has become the marker
of their 'merit' and 'knowledge'.
If IITs remained true to their
real objectives of promoting research
and development in sciences and
technology for the country, it could
never have afforded to create an
environment that promotes rote
learning and found the 'best brains'
in a very small segment of the country,
branding others as 'merit-less' and
'incompetent' Ÿ
26
Experiences of Dalit Students in IIT Delhi
I interviewed about 20 Dalit students from IIT Delhi to document their
campus experiences and to understand the nature and extant of prevalence
of caste discrimination in the campus. Interacting with them had been a
great learning experience for me as I had to spent lot of time with each of
them to break the ice. Initially, most of these Dalit students stated their
ignorance about prevalence of caste discrimination in the campus and
were reluctant to talk on caste, but after some rapport building between
us, they were very forthcoming about their experiences. I have compiled
some of their experiences below without revealing their identity. There
are many narratives, which I could not include as the nature of the
incidents might clearly betray the student's identity, even if I do not reveal
their names. Needless to say, these incidents were much more overt in
nature. - Author
Student No. 1 (Final Year B. Tech) I could not say anything because
Professors in IITs are undoubtedly here students don't speak anything
better than the rest in the country, before the professors as our fate
but there are some who need to be lies ultimately in their hands. They
corrected, who believe that all SC/ may fail us if they wish. However, I
ST students are weak in studies and kept on requesting for re-
all weak students have to be SC/ examination. Later, he agreed but I
STs. In my first semester, the was failed in that exam.
Physics professor was taking my Student No. 3 (IInd Year, B. Tech)
viva and I was not able to answer, Last year, I was attending a course
on which she became very annoyed and by then, I was already in the
and asked me, "Are you from Students Review Committee list.
quota?" I said, "No." Then she When one of my professors got the
explained, "Quota means SC/ST." I list, she told me, "SC/ST students
again answered, "No." She was are very poor and if I ask something
asking the same question to the from you, I don't think you will be
general category students, if they able to answer that". When I
were not able to answer in the viva. protested on her statement, she
Throughout her classes, I had the said, "Oh! So you want to fight with
fear that she would do something me!"
wrong in my grading. So, I was quite
After that she became very
nervous and never went to her for
hostile to me. Whenever I went for
any help or to clarify my doubts.
some clarification, she used to get
Student No. 2 (IInd Year, B. Tech) angry and rebuke me for not being
I was doing a course in Biotech able to understand 'simple' English
department. Due to my illness, I and always made very discouraging
didn't appear for one of the exams in comments like, "Are you always
that course. There is a rule that if the sleeping in the class? Why did you
student has not appeared due to join IIT if you don't know English?"
medical reason, he/she is allowed to
However, unlike other
sit for the re-exam, after submitting
students, I persisted in meeting her,
the medical certificate. When I asked
as I needed continued support. One
for my re-examination, the professor
day, she got very angry and told
immediately replied, “You come
me, "I think you are mad. You
through reservations in IIT and then
should get medical check-up."
don't even sit for exams.”
INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES Feb - Mar 2009
 Then I realized that it was
getting tough to cope up with her. I
called my father and then both of us
went and met the professor. She was
very rude to both of us and told my
father that there was something
wrong with me and I must consult a
doctor. My father tried to talk to her
but in vain. The professor did not
budge from her point that I am mad.
At the end, I failed in the subject. I
paid the price of asserting myself and
asking guidance from the professor.
Student No. 4 (IIIrd Year, B. Tech)
Standing Review Committee (SRC) is
supposed to monitor the student's
performance and help them to
improve. But, in practice, it does
nothing. In its meetings, the members
are least interested in listening to
student's problems. Normally, only
your past examination marks are
asked and then you are grilled /
ragged for that therefore not many
students willingly attend the
Institutional Mechanisms at IIT Delhi
If the Dalit students admitted in IITs, through Joint Entrance Exam (JEE), are so ‘weak’ that it results in such
a high dropout rate, has the IIT Delhi administration devised any mechanism to support these students to come at
par with others? Let us examine:
English Remedial Classes - In the
first semester, IIT Delhi offers one
course in English language for
students coming from non-English
medium schools. It is of 3 credits and
10+2 level English grammar is taught
in this course. It usually has 1-2
classes per week, totaling about 18-
20 classes in that semester. IIT Delhi,
with all its innocence, expects these
students to become proficient in
English, and come at par with other
students having at least 10-14 years
of English medium schooling, by
attending those 18-20 classes, spread
in less than 6 months. The interviews
with students revealed the non-
seriousness of such ‘ambitious’
Feb - Mar 2009
meetings.
Before the SRC meeting, we are
supposed to fill a form stating our
problems. In the meeting, one of the
professors sits with all the records,
and briefs other faculty members
about the concerned student. In one
such meeting, I filled up the form
where I mentioned all my problems.
When I went inside, one professor
showed my records to the two
neighbouring professors and said in
a hushed tone, "SC student". Then
one of the professors said, "Ok, let
him go".
Student No. 5 (IIIrd Year, B. Tech)
Here in IIT, we cannot form any group.
One of my Dalit seniors tried to
contact IIT administration to organize
an orientation programme for SC/ST
freshers. Immediately, a letter was
sent to his parents stating that, "your
son is involved in politics".
Pravin Togadia and Ashok
efforts.
Students regard this course as
absolutely ineffective, as the teacher
concentrates only on the English
grammar, which anyways they have
studied in the schools. The students
allege, that, even this is not taught
seriously. The students just try to
secure passing marks in this course
so as to get the credits.
According to the students,
major problems that engulf the first
year undergraduate non-English
medium students are, their inability
to comprehend the textbooks in
English, unfamiliarity with the
science-terms in English, together
INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES
Singhal can come and speak in the
IIT hostel (they came in the tenure
of the previous IIT Director) but the
students cannot organize Dr.
Ambedkar Jayanti in the campus.
Since the last few years, the SC/ST
Employees Association is
organizing Dr. Ambedkar Jayanti,
but when Dalit students tried to
organize, they faced stiff resistance
from the IIT administration and were
categorically asked the rationale for
celebrating Dr. Ambedkar's birthday
in IIT campus!
One funny incident that
reflects the prejudices and
ignorance of IIT faculties happened
few years back. On Dr. Ambedkar
Jayanti, the SC/ST Employees
Association invited IIT Director as
the chief guest. When asked to
speak, he just said one sentence,
"In IIT, there is no caste
discrimination" and went back to
his seat!
with the accent of the faculty
members. From the point of view of
the students, it is clear that, what is
important for them, here, is the
‘language’ of science and not English
grammar per se and its remedy is not,
just one course of XII std English
grammar.
The remedy lies in individual
faculty members identifying students
and supporting them, by giving some
extra time and promoting an
atmosphere, where the students feel
confident to interact about their
language problems. But the most
important is, not to treat such
students as ‘weak’ and victimize them.
27
However, given the level of student-
faculty interaction in IIT Delhi (it is
one sided), insincerity and
incompetence of IIT faculty members,
asking for this is really a very tall order.
SC/ST Cell - Under UGC guidelines,
most of the Indian universities and
colleges in the country have a special
SC/ST cell to monitor the
implementation of reservation as well
as to redress the grievances of the
SC/ST students. But IIT Delhi has
probably never heard of it or they
have given themselves the clean chit
of being a caste discrimination-free
campus! Hence, it has no such
mechanism and the SC/ST students
have no space, where they can share
and interact with the administration
on their specific problems. Given the
tendencies of IIT faculty, to hurl
castiest abuses and indulge in
discriminatory gradings, such
mechanisms are absolutely
necessary.
Course Adviser -According to the
IIT prospectus (page 17), “A number
of measures exist for helping students
belonging to SC and ST categories.
A senior faculty member is
appointed as adviser to SC/ST
students for advising them on
academic and non-academic
matters.” However, the truth is that
not even a single Dalit student was
able to tell the name of the Professor,
who was supposed to look after the
problems of SC/ST students. The
students were aware of this provision
but never came across any
information or notice regarding it,
ever. In the academic complex, there
is no trace of any SC/ST students’
advisor office or even a notice board.
Standing Review Committee-This
committee consists of some faculty
members, including the Dean for
Under-Graduate students, and is
supposed to identify students with
weak performances so as to guide/
support them for their improvement.
However, one would hear horrifying
28
stories of how, in SRC, instead of
patiently dealing with the student’s
problems, the faculties literally rag
them and create an atmosphere where
the student feels, in the words of one
Dalit student, ‘like a criminal in front
of the police officials’. Getting one’s
name in the SRC becomes another
marker of being a ‘weak’ student. The
list is sent to the faculty members and
that information is used by many of
them to humiliate the Dalit students,
as then it is ‘officially proved’ that
these students are ‘undeserving’ and
‘not fit for the IITs’.
Counselling Service- IIT Delhi runs
a Student Counselling Service under
the aegis of Board for Student
Welfare. This was created for
‘assisting students in sorting out
their difficulties and dilemmas in an
environment where they can talk
freely and in confidence about any
matter which is troubling them.’ (IIT
Delhi prospectus). The staff includes
psychologists, a psychiatric, and is
also drawn from faculty and student
volunteers. Many IIT faculties
believe, this student counselling
service to be the panacea for all ills.
So, if a student is facing some
difficulty in the course, the professor
would suggest, “to visit the
counsellor and get your mind
checked”.
During the interaction, the Dalit
students gave mixed reactions on the
efficacy of the counselling services.
Many of them were of the opinion,
that, they visited the counsellor for
the problems that were purely
academic in nature and hoped that
these were conveyed to the
concerned faculty members.
However, all the students were
unanimous in its ineffectiveness in
dealing with the caste problem. More
over, the counsellor also treated them
as ‘weak’ students, as one incident
narrated by an ex-student would
reveal. In 2002, when this student
went to the counsellor with his
INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES
problems, he was categorically told,
that, he was having such problems
due to his reserved category
background and would never able to
cope up with the IIT atmosphere!
SC/ST faculty -Since IITs are
‘institutes of national importance’ (as
defined by the Indian Parliament),
they have been exempted from the
provisions of SC/ST reservations in
faculty recruitments. None of the IIT
Delhi Dalit students were able to name
even a single faculty member from
these two communities, which
together constitutes one fourth of the
Indian population. However, later, we
were able to identify one SC
professor, who had retired 6 years
back. It is indeed shocking that, in
more than 45 years of its existence,
the IIT Delhi has failed to recruit more
than one faculty member from the
marginalized background. This itself
is a testimony of the type of exclusion
practiced by the IITs.
Orientation Programs - It is a
common practice in most of world-
renowned educational institutions to
organize specially designed
orientation programs for students
coming from non-mainstream
background (like ethnic or racial
minorities) to ease the transition of
such students from schools to
college/university. This is done in
order to acclimatize these students
with the campus environment and to
deal with the problems that might
occur due to their ‘lack’ of ‘cultural
capital’.
Since early 60’s, most US
universities and top institutions run
special orientation programs for both
blacks and women. Some of these
efforts are intense and extensive,
lasting up to six weeks. The goal of
all of these programmes is to ease
these students’ transition to college
life, to familiarize the student with his
or her new surroundings, and to
introduce these students to other
students who will have similar
Feb - Mar 2009
adjustment experiences. However, it
is to be noted that these programs
are not organized to make these
students to ‘come at par’ with others.
Their background is no indicator of
their ‘weakness’ but might point
towards little lack of exposure.
Coming from a different
background, Dalit students could
benefit immensely from such
programs. It would help Dalit
students to understand the IIT
structure and provide them the
confidence in IIT administration.
There are hundreds of studies
available that had proven the efficacy
of such programmes for students
from marginalized communities.
However, there is no such program in
IIT Delhi for SC/ST students at any
point of their stay, not even at the
time of their admission.
Support Systems-The MIT
(Massachusetts Institute of
Technology) , USA, on which IITs are
said to have been modeled, have
plethora of recognized student bodies
for different minorities (for example, a
very strong Black Students’ Union)
and run various programmes that
provide the much needed space for
these students to interact with each
other, to articulate their problems and
to negotiate with the MIT
administration. However, IITs believe
that there are only two types of
students – general category and
‘weak and thus undeserving’
students. Hence, they copied every
thing from MIT but forgot to replicate
the democratic institutional spaces
provided by MIT to the students from
different backgrounds.
IIT Delhi does not allow the
formation of any students’ groups in
the campus, other than those that are
run by the administration itself for
‘extra-curricular’ activities. In the past,
some of the Dalit students tried to
organize themselves informally, but
were unsuccessful.
Studies on the problems faced by SC/
ST students-It is interesting to note
that, despite the heavy dropout rate
of 25 % for the Dalit students, IITs
have never bothered to carry out even
a single systematic study of the
problems faced by the Dalit students.
One look at the website of MIT will
tell you, about the number of studies,
by the institute, on the problems faced
by the women and the African
Americans students and the
measures taken by them to increase
their representation, especially in
sciences Ÿ

“I knew I was stigmatized”

Rakesh Bawani did his B. Tech in Chemical Engineering from IIT Delhi, MA in International Relations,
M. Phil in Sociology from JNU, New Delhi and currently pursuing his PhD in Anthropology at
Brown University, Rhode Island, USA. Here, he narrates his experience of IIT Delhi.

During my first year, I was attending one Chemistry class in which some students tried to bunk through the back
door. However, one of them (with surname Srivastava) got caught. The professor got very angry and started
scolding him and asked the names of other students who had run away. There were 5-6 students. One of them had
surname ‘Meena’, which is a Tribal surname. As soon as the professor heard his name, he became angry all the more
and started making comments like ‘I know how they come here’, ‘these SC/ST students don’t deserve to come to
IIT’ and ‘they are ruining the IIT atmosphere’. He spoke for more than 15 minutes giving a ‘discourse’ on how ‘un-
teachable’ SC/ST students were. I was sitting in the class listening to him.
Now when I look back and reflect about my four years of stay in IIT, I can understand how that one particular
incident had marked my student life there. How could I trust the IIT professors when they had already passed the
judgment on me? I could never draw courage to reveal my caste identity to my friends in IIT. I knew I was
stigmatized. Since I knew English, I tried to pass off as non-Dalit. But that was not a happy solution. I had to hear
many derogatory remarks about Dr. Ambedkar, Mayawati and about other Dalit students within my friend circle but
I could never reply.
After graduating from IIT in 2003, I worked for six months and then joined Jawaharlal Nehru University for my
post-graduation. Here, things were far better. I came in touch with the Dalit students’ group working there and
slowly became assertive about my identity. I started appreciating my background.I belong to khatik caste. My
forefathers used to take out the skin of dead animals. My family had migrated to Delhi long back and both my
parents have raised me by working in tanneries, skinning dead animals. Why should I be ashamed of my parents, my
identity? Now, I am very much comfortable about my identity and in fact feel proud about my parents.

Feb - Mar 2009 INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES 29


The ‘upper’ caste IITians - both
faculties and students - bemoan a lot
about the reservation policy for SC/
ST students, claiming that it
downgrades the quality of Brand
‘IIT’. However, the truth is that these
IITs, themselves, are products of the
largesse of the developed countries.
These countries, in the name of ‘aid
in development for a Third World
Country’, not only, provided them
technical and financial support to
start with, but are still helping them
to upgrade and to remain at par,
through liberal scholarships and
various other assistance, so that the
Indians could run such ‘institutes of
excellence’.
IIT Bombay, founded in 1958,
was set up by UNESCO and the
erstwhile Soviet Union. IIT Madras
was established in 1959, with the
assistance from the Government of
the erstwhile West Germany. IIT
Kanpur was also established, in 1959,
by the US government and a
consortium of nine US universities
helped to set up the research
laboratories and academic
programmes there. Similarly, IIT Delhi
was established in 1961, by the
benevolence shown by the former
colonial masters United Kingdom.
Till now, not even a single IIT
has been able to stand on its own in
terms of research, cutting edge
technology, training, even after
guzzling huge amount of money from
the Indian exchequer and huge
financial aids from various other
sources including foreign countries.A
large number of today’s merit-
mongers (the IIT faculty members)
benefited from these foreign
scholarships together with an
opportunity to study in liberal foreign
campuses. It would have been
interesting if the citizens of these
countries had opposed these
opportunities provided to Indians,
arguing that such efforts were diluting
30
Brand IIT: The Myth and the Reality
the ‘quality’ of their campuses and
taking away opportunities from their
own deserving candidates!
In the Shanghai Jiao Tong
University’s academic Ranking of
World Universities (2006), IIT
Kharagpur was the only engineering
college from India listed among the
top 500 universities worldwide and
that too among the lowest bracket
(below 400). The purpose of this
ranking by the Chinese university
was, “to find out the gap between
Chinese universities and world-class
universities, particularly in terms of
academic or research performance.”
This ranking is an honest
attempt by the Chinese to improve
their universities and technical
institutes. In contrast, nobody has
ever heard of such an attempt from
India. Except one, no other IITs
figured in the list of top 500 institutes
worldwide. It is intriguing that the
IITs, monopolized by much
‘meritorious’ upper caste community,
are not able to compete with foreign
institutions, even after years of
continued support and assistance
from many reputed institutions and
at the expense of huge public money,
the budgetary allocations for IITs for
the year 2005, being a whopping 650
crores!
Many efforts are being made
to cleverly create a façade of IITs as
great, ‘quality’ institutions,
producing ‘brilliant’ researchers,
engineers, etc. Why this façade is
being created? It is to hide a very
important fact.
The Indian Parliament
envisioned that the IIT system would
“provide scientists and technologists
of the highest calibre, who would
engage in research, design and
development, to help building the
nation towards self-reliance in her
technological needs.” A Central
statute, the Indian Institute of
INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES
Technology Act, 1956, & 1961,
declared the IITs to be “of national
importance”, thus paving the way for
huge financial support from the
government as well as for the
conferring of a higher degree of
autonomy. However, instead of
providing scientists and
technologists for the country, IITs
have turned themselves into
institutions for providing lucrative
jobs, both in India and abroad, for
the kith and kin of urban English
speaking upper caste/middle class,
and in the process, completely
sidelining their basic objectives. That
is why, the ‘quality’ of IITs is being
marked in direct proportion to the pay
packages offered to the students by
the multinationals and not by any
technological innovations.
This is the precise reason
behind so much hostility against SC/
ST students in these campuses, as
their entry into these institutions
would shrink the lucrative job
opportunities for the ruling class.
Hence, all the chest thumping of
‘merit’ and IIT being the ‘Centre of
excellence and quality’ becomes
necessary in order to hide the fact
that the IITs, rather than preparing
students for research and
development (the reason for their
creation), have completely
metamorphosed themselves into
institutions that cater only to the
interests of the parasitic upper caste/
middle class and the multinationals
companies.
If the IITs remained honest
towards their basic objective of
facilitating the development of the
country through research, they would
have gladly accepted the entry of
students from the communities that
have been directly involved in the
production processes like Dalits and
Tribals, instead of stigmatizing these
students as inherently ‘weak’, based
on their performance in entrance
exams Ÿ
Feb - Mar 2009

“The Need of Cultural
Revolution in West Bengal”
Dr. Anjan Ghosh teaches Sociology in Centre for Studies in Social
Sciences (CSSS), Kolkata. Here, he interacts with Sandali on
various issues in context of caste in West Bengal.
There are two major trajectories of discourses around
caste - one in which caste system has been seen as a
system of stratification, and the other, where caste
discrimination has been foregrounded. Since Dalits
constitute a large part of the population of West Bengal,
what has been the nature of discourse around caste here?
Apart from these two discourses that you have suggested,
there are multiple discourses of caste. Beyond that, the
Dalit question has been looked into through these two
particular lenses that you mentioned- basically, in terms
of caste inequality or in terms of caste subsumption- that
is inclusion within the ritual fold; for example, Michael
Moffat's study on Dalit groups in Tamil Nadu, where he
talks about how hierarchy is extremely strong among Dalits.
It is there among brahmins, 'upper' caste groups but also
among Dalits. This has meant that the question of caste,
as has been looked upon by sociologists, have in a sense
been sidetracked or bypassed by Dalit activists, because
they have felt constricted by these two positions.
Their basic position has been that there should be
recognition of the Dalits as Dalits and that they should
not be socially and culturally oppressed and effaced from
social recognition. It means that their approach is mainly
in terms of identities, rather than in terms of classes, or
status groups. They are concerned with sociological
discourse only in so far as those bring to the fore socially
oppressive mechanisms and ways of outcasting,
marginalizing, stigmatizing Dalits. These modes of
distinction have been discussed quite a bit in the traditional
and anthropological literature in gazetteers, caste manuals,
etc.
But that is not what sociologists in modern India have
been concerned with so much. They have been concerned
with the power dimension of inequality- in terms of
economic exchange, political authority- how political,
social authority is exercised in the village and the city
neighbourhoods. Whereas Dalit activists today are much
more concerned with recognition, identity and symbolic
representation.
Dalits constitute a large part of the population of West
Bengal. But caste does not feature in the political discourse
Feb - Mar 2009 INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES
Interview
of West Bengal. It does not mean that caste does not
exist. It is very much prevalent in rural, urban or semi-
urban, small-town communities. And yet, there is very little
public articulation about caste. Caste articulations are more
in the domestic sphere and in the sphere of marriage
alliances. For instance, sweepers are not allowed to enter
into the household. People who clean the bathrooms will
never be allowed to enter into the living rooms, let alone
the kitchen, since sweepers, by virtue of their caste
occupation, are considered to have a polluting influence.
This is of course transparent, something that is quite
evident to a degree.
So, though caste discrimination is recognized and
practiced in the social sphere, it does not get any
articulation in the political sphere. This is partly due to the
hegemony exercised by the Bengali bhadraloks in the
public sphere. They have been the principal ideologues
of the nationalist movement, through which they have
hegemonized their position. Their understanding of caste
as an issue is that caste is regressive; it is traditional,
backward-looking and, therefore, not modern. It is a pre-
modern institution and not something to be coveted.
Consequently, it does not figure into the political
discourse, which is all about modernity, advancement,
industrialization and so on. Secondly, in terms of political
organization, people are mobilized on class affiliations and
not on caste, primarily, because it is thought that caste
divides.
In West Bengal, the nature of discourse around caste
has been displaced by a discourse of Tribal identity, which
can be found from Jharkhand to the Rajbansis in north
Bengal. Then, there is the minority discourse of dissent.
Muslims were so far very close to the Left, since the Left
had taken a very strident, secular stand. But that is
dissipating, as one can see from some of the movements
like the one in Nandigram. That kind of whole-hearted
support that they enjoyed earlier is getting fractured by
several issues like those of madarasa education, illegal
border traffic, social conservatism, and so on. So, the caste
issue has not featured significantly here. It does have a
small resonance in the border district of Nadiya (district
31
adjacent to Bangladesh) where a large number of the
Namasudras (a Dalit caste) had built up a movement in the
1950s.
Is caste discrimination prevalent in West Bengal? What
is its nature as compared to other states where caste is
'visible'? What do the following indicators speak about
the prevalence, nature and extent of caste discrimination
in the state- practice of untouchability, access to places of
worship, land holding, access to education, and proportion
of Dalit students in higher education?
As I mentioned just now, with regard to access to places
of worship and domestic spaces, restrictions still exist.
With regard to land holding and access to drinking water,
etc., these are not so severely practiced. Land-holdings
partly because we have had a long history of peasant
movements, which has enabled 'lower' caste groups to
atleast get some rights over land, as tenants and marginal
farmers, even if they have not got ownership of land. As
far as access to education is concerned, there is no actual
debarring of education but there are various kinds of
discriminatory practices in terms of sitting, eating with the
'upper' caste children during the mid-day meals etc. These
have affected the lives of Dalits in different ways. There
are examples of people who have succeeded, even though
they hailed from very modest backgrounds, like Meghnad
Saha. There have been some such examples of 'lower' caste
people, who have succeeded by dint of their own efforts.
But that does not mean that there has been any kind of
state support for their uplift.
Amongst the 'untouchable' groups, very few people have
been able to access education. As a result, they have not
been able to uplift themselves through their own efforts;
they have to depend on others. And that makes them more
vulnerable. Secondly, in terms of livelihoods, they have to
depend on labour. They can rarely send their children to
school because they cannot afford the opportunity cost.
Children's labour is important for household expenses-
one major reason why 'lower' caste groups stay out of
education.
The Bengali bhadralok is the leading class of the Bengali
intelligentsia and has been dominanting the socio-
political life of West Bengal. Who constitutes the
bhadralok? Is it a 'cultural' category/ construction or a
caste category? How flexible is this category?
Bhadralok is not a caste category, it is a cultural category.
It is a status group, as some people have mentioned. J. H.
Broomfield wrote a book called 'Elite Conflict in Plural
Society- Twentieth Century Bengal', where he tried to
classify the bhadraloks. They are an elite group but are
mainly confined to the three caste groups of Brahmin,
Kayastha and Vaidya. Vaidyas and Kayasthas are basically
Sudra castes. So, bhadralok as a caste category is not
32 INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES
convergent with class positions. Many people who
constitute part of the bhadralok come from relatively 'lower'
caste groups, especially the trading castes. With the arrival
of the British, a number of 'lower' caste groups- traders,
businesspeople- were able to, through their association
with the British, enhance their status.
While efforts were made by the society and the state to
integrate the 'upper' caste refugees from East Pakistan
(now Bangladesh) into West Bengal's socio-economic
fabric, Dalit refugees were thrown out of West Bengal by
forcing them to settle in inhospitable areas of MP and
other states. Both Congress and the CPI (M) were party
to that. When the Dalits opposed, they were massacred in
Marichjhapi. How do you look at that?
Marichjhapi happened in 1978, after the Left Front
government had come to power in West Bengal. 'Lower'
caste refugees from Bangladesh were sent off to
Dandakaranya in Madhya Pradesh for rehabilitation,
primarily because they could not be accommodated in and
around the city of Calcutta or anywhere in the state. Most
people, who went to Dandakaranya, had come to India
after the 1964 riots. They were directly sent-off from the
border to these places. Secondly, Dandakaranya was a
forest area which could be cleared for cultivation. However,
it turned out to be an extremely rugged land, where
cultivation was difficult. The government could not provide
much assistance. They did provide coal, etc. but it was
difficult to survive in such harsh conditions. And given
the shift that the people had to make from lush, alluvial
soil back home to this water-scarce, extremely rocky soil
conditions, it became extremely difficult for them to sustain
cultivation. The 'upper' caste refugees were also not
provided with land by the state but they managed to grab
land. They settled around the areas like Dum Dum,
Jadavpur, and Garia in Kolkata. The area around
Santoshpur was all swampy land. The 'lower' caste people,
eventually, had to inhabit these marshy areas.
What has been the position of the CPI (M) state government
vis-à-vis Dalits of West Bengal? How democratic is the
structure of CPI (M) with respect to the inclusion of Dalits
in the decision-making in the party?
To be fair to the CPI (M), in one sense, it has allowed for
the emergence of a certain section of the Dalits in their
leadership. I shall illustrate this. We know that politics
cannot be done without funds. And for an individual Dalit,
who aspires to fight elections, it is difficult to mobilize
funds. This creates a certain kind of dependency nexus.
On the other hand, being a party of the working class
people, the CPI (M) sponsors all its candidates. This has
allowed a certain number of people to emerge from the
grassroots to at least become regional- district, provincial-
leaders. It works like this - all the CPI (M) MLAs have to
Feb - Mar 2009

contribute most of their salary to the party fund. All party
functionaries are given stipend/ living allowance from this
fund. People within the party are sponsored, regardless of
their caste, class. This enables greater number of less
privileged sections to emerge as leaders. For instance,
one can find a number of people from SC and BC
communities in the different ministries.
This phenomenon could, however, be also looked at from
a different perspective. CPI (M) could be using these
people as tokens- as representatives of these sections-
but not holding much decision-making power. Here is a
slippery kind of a problem. Land reforms, for example, have
benefited many of the bargadars, a number of whom are
SC/ ST. They have not been benefited as SC/ST people,
but as bargadars, as tenants, as sharecroppers. Yet, in
terms of statutory regulations, West Bengal has fared
pretty badly, both in education and employment. The
human development report will illustrate this. It is a very
elusive situation, because people have benefited in certain
ways but they have not been able to assert their identity,
dignity and respect. In other words, cultural recognition
or cultural revolution has not happened.
The Chengara movement has exposed the much-touted
Kerala land reforms. It has highlighted that 80-90% of
the Dalits and Tribals are landless, despite the land
reforms. The Dalits in Chengara are now charting a new,
independent movement, foregrounding their identity, on
the same issue of land that the Left had always espoused.
In this context, what is the situation of land reforms in
West Bengal?
In West Bengal, quite a sizeable section of people have
got land, though it has not brought about much
substantial changes. This has happened because though
land was available for people, they did not possess the
means of production to deploy on that land. Secondly,
most of the time, the land was not in one piece; it was
scattered. So, though people got land, in practice they
were not always able to cultivate it. This is the reason why
land reform in West Bengal has been unable to take account
of its own successes. The kinds of contradictions that
have arisen from land redistribution have not been
addressed. It was thought that if the landless got land,
they would have the means to uplift themselves.
Do you foresee any kind of Dalit movement/ assertion
happening in the near future in West Bengal?
I do not see a Dalit assertion in West Bengal like the way
it has happened in Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra and UP. But
Sandali(sojourner.sandali@gmail.com) is pursuing Research Training Programme (RTP) at Centre for Studies in
Social Sciences, Kolkata
Feb - Mar 2009 INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES
Interview
one does find the articulation of a different idiom of politics
which has taken account of, not simply the 'lower' caste or
Tribal groups as such but 'people on the streets'.
In other words, one finds the incorporation of the popular
masses into West Bengal's institutionalized politics, which
had so far been dominated by the Bengali bhadraloks.
And this is clearly epitomized by Mamata Bannerji's rise.
This is completely distinguished from any kind of Dalit
movement. The Namasudra movement has not succeeded
in establishing Namosudras as leaders. Infact, the
Namosudra movement has been transformed from a
movement for cultural recognition to a religious sect (the
Motua sect).
Then, the Bahujan Samaj Party has some kind of presence
in the state but not that much. Consequently, they have
not been able to make headway. The Dalit movement,
however, has begun to make its presence felt in the cultural
sphere, in terms of publications and literature. And it is in
this sphere that the struggle for self-recognition is
happening.
Last but not the least, what is the status of the
implementation of Reservation policy for SC/STs in
CSSS?
Our approach is that we nurture bright students who come
from marginalized sections. We believe that there should
not be any distinction between students belonging to the
SC/ST/OBC communities and the mainstream. We have
had some very good experience in the past. I should
mention with confidence that some of our students coming
from these sections have done extremely well. I think that
though a person belonging to, say, the SC community
might want to assert his cultural identity; he might not like
to be labelled as a person who has gained entry into
academics through the quota.
I am saying that, in the public mind, there is this kind of
association between quotas and academic capabilities. So,
if we can circumvent this association and yet nurture them,
it may allow them to enhance their capacities, so that they
will never be identified as an SC/ ST person- in their
professional fields. For example, I might be proud of being
a Dalit Christian or a Dalit activist. It does not mean that I
want to advertise the benefits of reservation. This is the
association that is there in the public mind. When they are
going to go out in the world, they will be excluded,
demarcated as quota people. If they are able to work at par
with the others in terms of their own capacity and academic
potential, then they can avoid being identified as quota
people Ÿ
33
 Remembering Marichjhapi Massacre, 1979
Thousands of Dalit refugees were killed by the West Bengal government, in one of the biggest human rights
violation in post independent India. Due to the conspiratorial silence of the Bengali civil society not much is
know to outsiders. Below are the excerpts from an article, “ Refugee Resettlement in Forest Reserves: West
Bengal Policy Reversal and the Marichjapi Massacre” written by Ross Mallick, published in The Journal of
Asian Studies, Vol. 58, No. 1 (Feb. 1999).
T he events leading up to the refugee massacre revealed
a trail of communal and class conflict that had its roots
many centuries earlier. The gap between the Muslim and
Untouchable tenants was arguably not as great as that
between the Untouchables and upper-caste landlords, and
in the colonial period Untouchables and Muslims were
political allies in opposition to the Hindu-landlord-
dominated Bengal Congress Party. In the colonial period,
the East Bengal Namasudra movement had been one of
the most powerful and politically mobilized Untouchable
movements in India and in alliance with the more numerous
Muslims, had kept the Bengal Congress Party in opposition
from the 1920s. The exclusion of high-caste Hindus from
power led to the Hindu elite and eventually the Congress
Party pressing for partition of the province at
independence, so that at least the western half would return
to their control.
With the partition of India it was the upper-caste
landed elite who were the most threatened by their tenants
and who had the wherewithal in education and assets to
migrate to India. Even those not as well off had the
connections to make a fairly rapid adjustment in India.
The first waves of refugees were traditional uppercaste
elite. Those who lacked town houses and property in India
squatted on public and private land in Calcutta and other
areas, and resisted all attempts to evict them. The failure
of the Congress government to grant them squatters'
ownership and its attempts at eviction provided the
Communist opposition with a ready following among the
refugees, who gradually came to be organized by
Communist-front organizations. Faced with this resistance
and the public sympathy they generated among their
relatives and caste members, the Congress government
acquiesced in the illegal occupations.
Later refugees came from the lower classes, who
lacked the means to survive on their own and became
dependent on government relief. Lacking the family and
caste connections of the previous middleclass refugees,
they had to accept the government policy of dispersing
them to other states, on the claim that there was insufficient
vacant land available in West Bengal. However, the land
the Untouchable refugees were settled on in other states
were forests in the traditional territory of Tribal peoples,
34 INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES
who resented this occupation. The crops and agricultural
works of the refugees were periodically destroyed or
harvested by Tribal peoples. While the upper-caste
squatters were getting their colonies legalized and services
provided, the Untouchables became exiled to other states
where they faced often hostile local populations.
In this period the Left-dominated opposition took
up the case of the Untouchable refugees and demanded
the government settle to them within their native Bengal
rather than scatter them across India on the lands of other
peoples. The sites mentioned in West Bengal for
resettlement were either the Sundarbans area of the Ganges
delta or vacant land scattered in various places throughout
the state. In 1977, the CPI (M) led Left Front defeated
Congress in the assembly elections and formed
government in West Bengal.
Having sold their belongings to pay for the trip,
15,000 refugee families left Dandakaranya only to discover
that Left Front policy had changed now that the coalition
was in power, and many refugees were arrested and
returned to the resettlement camps. The remaining refugees
managed to slip through police cordons, reaching their
objective of Marichjhapi island, where settlement began.
The state government was not disposed to tolerate such
settlement, stating that the refugees were "in unauthorised
occupation of Marichjhapi which is a part of the
Sundarbans Government Reserve Forest violating thereby
the Forest Acts".
When persuasion failed to make the refugees
abandon their settlement, the Left Front West Bengal
government started, on January 26, 1979, an economic
blockade of the settlement with thirty police launches.
The community was tear-gassed, huts were razed, and
fisheries and tube wells were destroyed, in an attempt to
deprive refugees of food and water. At least several
hundred men, women, and children were said to have been
killed in the operation and their bodies dumped in the
river. "Out of the 14,388 families who deserted [for West
Bengal], 10,260 families returned to their previous places
... and the remaining 4,128 families perished in transit, died
of starvation, exhaustion, and many were killed in Kashipur,
Kumirmari, and Marichjhapi by police firings" (Biswas
1982, 19) Ÿ
Feb - Mar 2009
Photo Courtesy ICM School, Khuduhuriah

Bihar School Text Books

Politics of Syllabus
Brahmanism is trifle subdued in School textbooks in Bihar as compared to
textbooks from other states, but it is definitely not absent. This is despite the
fact that the State has been ruled by the non-Congress, self-styled champions
of social justice, for almost two decades now.
by Arun Kumar

E
ducation as an integral part of
state system is roughly a four
centuries' old phenomenon.
Prior to the rise of the nation-state,
education by and large was a private
affair, managed either by the raja or
the gurukul, the priest or the prince,
or at times by both in a partnership.
The market and nation-state entered
the classroom later.
Nation-states call for a citizenry
that conform to their image and
interest. That may explain why states
all over the world keep such a tight
control over education of their young
minds. No wonder, changing school
textbooks and syllabi today are seen
as nothing less than tinkering with
the past, present, and the future of
the nation itself, thus rendering it
undesirable.
No wonder, then, that 'the past'
gets re-constructed every time a
change is attempted in 'the present'.
No wonder, then, that school
textbooks are replete with lessons on
patriotism of a particular kind. And,
no wonder, then, that the call to
sacrifice oneself at the border of the
nation-state is propagated as the
greatest of all virtues.
Therefore, there is nothing
hidden about the agenda of the
education system in India. As we can
well imagine, a conformist agenda
rewards internalisation of
confirmation and punishes
questioning, criticality and change.
Democracy and equality, for instance,
can be taught as concepts, as long
as there are no suggestions for
democratising them for all.
Philosophically speaking, and
this is true of not only Indian
education system but education
systems almost everywhere, a
privileged part is taught as the whole
– Brahmanic history gets projected
as the Ancient Indian history; the
Indian National Congress (INC)
becomes the Indian national
movement; the political freedom from
the British under the hegemony of the
INC becomes the Freedom
Movement. In other words, all other
movements that fought for political
freedom and economic, socio-cultural
emancipation fail to get their due.
The nationalist, the 'General', in
other words, becomes synonymous
with the 'upper' caste, privileged,
propertied male. The onus thus is on
the 'less than General', the Scheduled,

Feb - Mar 2009 INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES 35

 Hindu/Brahmanic universals are a trifle subdued in Hindi
textbooks in Bihar as compared to textbooks from other States,
but they are definitely not absent. Birsa, for instance, gets
mentioned as Bhagwan; but there is not even a reference to the
fact that he was an Adivasi
the marginalised, Dalits, women and
children to recast education and the
society that exists today.
Social Science textbooks in
Bihar are no exception. This is despite
the fact that they are better textbooks
than those from several other states
of India which are ahead of it in the
realm of education. This is also despite
the fact that the State has been ruled
by the non-Congress, self-styled
champions of social justice of one
variety or another, for almost two
decades now. They are at best
tokenistic in nature when it comes to
correcting age-old biases in favour of
'upper' caste, middle class male. The
sovereignty of abstract nationalism
and patriotism is kept intact; the need
to familiarize (and thus prepare to
challenge) socio-economic inequalities
is missing, just like in textbooks of
other states.
The Preface of a textbook for
Standard III announces the book to
be child-oriented and committed to
children's overall development with
special focus on their 'moral, national
(what ever it means) and human
qualities'. The focus supposedly is on
'a balanced individual development' so
that the children can become
'responsible citizens' and 'work for the
prosperity, freedom, secularism and
integration of the country'. How
exactly these 'responsible citizens' are
to make sense of the real world they
live in and confront on a daily basis
remains unclear.
History textbooks appear to be
on the right track, as for the first time
subaltern heroes (those from the
marginalized communities) and their
voices find a place in the narratives
of freedom movements. But these
history textbooks still have some
36
distance to cover, for they appear as
addendum and not as a corrective
measure to the mainstream, 'upper'
caste, upper class Congress saga of
the Independence movement.
So, it's highly encouraging, for
example, to see Battakh Mian Ansari
of Champaran (he saved Gandhi's life
before the latter could become
Mahatma) being taught along with
the known and the familiar elites.
However, there is no critical
engagement with why he was left to
suffer the wrath of the British alone,
why the Gandhi-led congress didn't
come to his rescue, why the
mainstream history (the practice of
history) and History (as a knowledge
system) both developed a studied
amnesia towards his contribution and
subsequent ruin.
Hindu/Brahmanic universals
are a trifle subdued in Hindi
textbooks in Bihar as compared to
textbooks from other States, but they
are definitely not absent. Birsa, for
instance, gets mentioned as
Bhagwan; but there is not even a
reference to the fact that he was an
Adivasi. Similarly, there is a lesson
on Siddhartha- who saves the swan
wounded by his brother- without any
mention that it was this Siddhartha
who went on to become the Buddha.
Brahmanism also cripples Hindi
textbooks through the selection and
rejection of words. Hindustani makes
it first tentative appearance in
standard IV. Till then the books, for
instance, teach "prayatn", and then
explain that it means, "koshish"
(effort). Why a State where
Hindustani has deep roots in its
lingua franca would do so is difficult
to comprehend. Or, may be not.
In the beginning of the 20th
INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES
century, controversies
with regards to the
nature of Hindi tilted in
favour of purified,
Sanskrit-based Hindi,
'necessitating' purging
out words of Arabic,
Persian and Urdu origins. This
linguistic tussle was in a way a
reflection of the 19th century politico-
cultural Brahminical propaganda,
known as Shuddhi and Sangathan,
which in turn had a direct bearing on
the national movement led by the
INC. The 'victory' of the nationalist
Congress in the political realm
resulted in the domination of a Hindi
that was closer to the Brahmanic India
and removed from the non-
Brahmanic castes and communities.
To illustrate the problem of
Brahmanism crippling Hindi
textbooks, some examples can be
cited. A chapter called "Eid" opens
up with dialogues between Radha and
Razia. Razia shares: 'Ramzaan
humlogon ka nauwan mahina hota
hai.' 'Humlogon ka' is for Muslims
who follow the Islamic calendar.
Children are expected to know that
Razia is a Muslim. The term 'Muslim',
however, is never used in the text.
That is some confidence in diversity!
The erasure of the Dalit and other
marginalised sections of society, we
can notice, is done with numbing
obstinacy.
Spare a moment for the Chapter
on Kabir. Maintaining correctly that
not much is known about Kabir's
biological parents and their religion,
the text slyly turns them, and Kabir,
into Hindu. Neeru and Neema, Kabir's
parents, who found and brought him
up, were julahas (weavers). But,
notice the politics of language: 'Ve ek
bachche ke liye pratidin Ishwar se
prarthana kiya karte the'.
Pratidin Ishwar se prarthana?
It hardly leaves any ambiguity
about the religion of Neeru and
Neema, does it? It sounds as if they
Feb - Mar 2009
were Hindu. In any event, is there seen any civilised society other than [after the abolition] satisfied)!
confusion about the religion of their own. There are even such weird This gets really confusing for
julahas in the Benaras region where communities who still live in naked children. If zamindari is bad (hence
Kabir grew? or semi-naked condition) the need for its abolition in the first
There is a story that upon the One may ask, what is this place) then why pay compensation
death of Kabir his Hindu and Muslim backward state in which the naked to the bad guys? Clearly, the textbook
followers fought over his last rites. and the half-naked Adivasis are said editors do not find it confusing. Nor
When the kafan (shroud) was taken to be living in? Which is this do those who can see through the
off his dead body, as the myth has it, supposedly 'other civilised' society, text the class politics, the leadership
there were only flowers, and no body, if it is not of the non-Adivasis, the of Bihar Congress, the caste and class
which the followers divided among society of the editors of the text that locus of the protagonist and so on.
themselves. The text, duty-bound, as the tribals have not seen and known? This also highlights the fact that the
it were, reports this myth. But look at A society that imposes nudity on its interests of Congress elites and 'anti-
the question it asks: 'What followed women for entertainment finds the Congress' Socialist elites (under
the death of Kabir?' In answering this nudity among adivasis 'strange'. At whose regime these books were
question, we can imagine, the mythic least nudity among adivasis is not prepared) do not necessarily differ
tale will become a truth of sorts. What gendered; both men and women use when it comes to structural issues like
will get ignored is that it was just a scanty clothes. The lesson redefines zamindari or land-holding.
myth after all. the height of condescension when it One of my favourite texts is
Another chapter 'Jangal ki Lok calls the adivasis 'vanphool' (flower lesson 15 / Bal Bharati IV. It is an
Kathayein' (Folktales of the Jungle) is of the forest). experimental text; it weaves and
blends the story of Balram and
The meaning of Brahma is given as the one who created Krishna into a modern setting
the world. Whose world? Does this world include Muslims, where every one is in harmony
with everyone; tillers or the
Christians, Dalits, and Adivasis as well? Or, is it only the ruler, all work. One wonders,
world of Brahmans, which is then assumed to represent however, if such a picture would
everybody's world? create conflict with what
children actually observe in
a rather sad sample of half-baked The class bias of the people everyday life. What if it does? How
political correctness. It is reminiscent managing the education system in is the teacher going to explain the lack
of parroting a jargon in vogue without the State becomes clear in the of harmony, the rupture, and the
really understanding it. Or, it could be Chapter: 'Bihar Vibhuti Dr. Anugraha inequality in society?
about learning something new without Narayan Singh'. It mentions that The same could be the concern
unlearning the stereotype that actually Anugraha Narayan's father was a with the lesson: 'Suman Ek Upavan
goes against the grains of the new 'prosperous zamindar', that Anugraha Ke'. It is a good poem to teach plurality
learning. The lesson commences with Narayan played a central role in and diversity at young age. But, what
how we ought not to view the 'zamindari unmoolan' (abolition of if the students question the text itself,
Adivasis, that they are not uncivilised zamindari system), but the text as the reality they witness runs
and barbaric. One begins to wonder if conveniently omits to tell the children contrary to the message of the text?
this indeed is a clean departure from who is a zamindar, or, what is There is no mechanism suggested for
the past. But, alas, the joy is dashed in zamindari? the students and the teachers of the
the very next moment: Since, the protagonist's father text as to how to deal with the gap
'Lekin phir bhi kuchh samaj was a zamindar, children might assume between experiential reality and what
abhi bahut pichhadi dasha mein hain that it's a good thing. But, then, why is prescribed for learning and
jinhon ne apne alawa kisi doosre would the protagonist play a role in teaching.
unnat samaj ko nahin dekha hai. abolishing it? The text, however, Bal Bharati V introduces
Aise ajeebogharib samaj bhi hain jo carries some honesty when it says, additional scourge. Parochialism and
aaj bhi nagn athwa ardhnagn 'uchit muaawada [sic] ki vyavastha jingoism are taught as patriotism. 'We
awastha mein rehte hain.' (But there kar unhon ne zamindaron ko are the best', the lesson 1 beats its
are a few communities that are still in santusht rakha' (with proper chest aloud. Our nation gives the
very backward state and have not compensation, he kept the zamindars message of equality; it wishes no one

Feb - Mar 2009 INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES 37

suffered ever; every living being
is equal and so on. Is it about time
the import of humility was
registered? How a Dalit girl would
relate to such pronouncements is
anybody's guess. Veer ras
pervades the text, calling for war,
sacrifice and martyrdom (Veer
Abhimanyu, Sher Shivaji, Jhansi
ki Rani, etc).
The problem of innocent
looking, but actually dangerous
and divisive Hindu universal is
especially acute in this book. The
meaning of Brahma is given as the
one who created the world
(lesson 2). Whose world? Does
this world include Muslims,
Christians, Dalits, and Adivasis
as well? Or, is it only the world of
Brahmans, which is then assumed
to represent everybody's world?
What about the world of a non-
believer? But, that would be too
distant a world for the editors to
comprehend, I presume.
Consider yet another example.
'Paropkari Vriksha' (Benevolent Tree)
is supposed to be a text on
environment. And this is how the
significance of trees is underlined:
'Dharmik granthon mein vriksha
lagana punya aur katna pap mana
gaya hai' [Religious texts consider
planting of tree to be pious and
cutting it down to be a sin].
Yet another one: Hamare
granthon mein kaha gaya hai ki
vriksha manushya ke putra ke
saman hain (ibid) [Our scriptures
consider trees to be like sons of Man].
Whose ‘dharmik granth’
(religious scripture) is the book talking
about? The Adivasis who live in
jungles and depend on the produce
from trees for their survival have no
granth. The shudras have no granth.
The Qur'an does not say that trees
Arun Kumar (arun.kumar@crymail.org) is working with Child Rights and You (CRY) as General Manager, Youth.
The usual disclaimer holds.
38
are like our sons (daughters are out
of question, of course!). The Vedas
and the Puranas become the generic
'ours'/hamare. The Brahmanic
worldview gobbles up the rest.
The champions of secularism
were fast asleep when these
textbooks were being produced, it
seems. 'Sher Shivaji' is a reproduction
of history inspired by Hindutva's
ideology. Shivaji relentlessly and
incorrectly continues to be made the
symbol of 'Hindu' resistance against
'Muslims' oppression. Nothing could
be farther from truth. He fought
Aurangzeb, not because he was
championing the cause of 'oppressed
Hindus'. He fought because
Aurangzeb was willing to grant him
mansabdari of 5,000 and not of 7,500,
the amount he was willing to settle
for. Shivaji, the so-called symbol of
Hindu gallantry, actually wanted to
serve the Mughals. The quarrel was
not over ideology or religion but
salary; both were feudal kings who
thrived on looting the peasantry, at
times in unison, at times with an eye
INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES
on monopoly to do so.
'Bihar Kesari Dr. Shri
Krishna Singh', has 'Harijan
Mandir Pravesh' (temple entry of
harijans) as one of his major
accomplishments, but no space is
provided for discussions on this
aspect in the exercise. Would the
children ask, why the so-called
harijans were not allowed to enter
a temple? Can they not also
wonder why some are still not
allowed to enter a temple? And,
could they also enquire about
other caste-related issues, like,
untouchability? How long we can
shy away from the question of
caste and why is what we need to
ask the educationists/editors
concerned. How exactly is the
teacher trained today to address
these questions? But, that is another
story for another time.
A child from Dalit or any
marginalized background suffers
double assault; first because of the
prevailing social inequalities and
secondly, in school textbooks where
she is forced to accept what is
contrary to her real life experiences
as education. The real life experiences
eventually make such children see the
project of Nation-building with great
suspicion, while the school learning
turns them hostile to both, school and
learning.
The sincerity with which issues
of dignity, identity, or equality are
raised in the political realm has a
reflection in the kinds of textbooks
that are given to children. Half-
hearted, tokenistic/symbolic,
contradictory, insensitive to the
marginalized is what we experience in
real life political theatre. And this is
what our children get to learn as
knowledge and values. We owe them
better. And they need it nowŸ
Feb - Mar 2009

“Benefits of Reservation should reach to all”
Suresh kumar Digumarthi is one of the leading student
activists in the University of Hyderabad. Here he interacts
with Anoop Kumar on various issues concerning University
Dalit student community.
Suresh, please tell our readers about your background.
I am doing my PhD in the Department of Political Science,
University of Hyderabad. I belong to the Madiga
community and my father works in the Andhra Pradesh
Health Department. My mother is a housewife. Both my
parents were first generation literates. However, they could
not access higher education. I have three siblings. Despite
meager means, my parents did their best to provide us
education; but it was the government scholarship that
actually enabled us to aspire for higher education.
You have been actively participating in the Dalit
movement, along with your studies. How did you get
introduced to the movement?
I started participating in the Dalit movement only when I
joined the University of Hyderabad. Before that, I was not
very keen on our issues. One reason might be that my
father hid our caste identity, as he was working in an area
where there were not many Dalits. But when I joined the
University in 1999, I was exposed to a very strong Dalit
consciousness, present in the campus due to the student
activism, that made me quite comfortable vis-à-vis my own
identity and further interaction with my seniors drew me
towards the Dalit movement.
University of Hyderabad is known for its very strong and
vibrant Dalit students’ movement. However, one also
witnesses a sharp division among the Dalit students on
caste lines. What are the reasons of such a division?
Though it might appear to be so but I don’t think the
division among the Dalit students are on the caste lines. It
is issue-based and that issue is classification among the
Dalit communities of Andhra Pradesh. This issue is a highly
contentious one that came to the forefront in the 1980s. In
AP, there are two major Dalit castes- Mala and Madiga,
apart from many smaller castes. The Madigas have been
demanding classification among the Dalit community, so
that there are equal opportunities for all the Dalit castes to
get the benefit of reservations. But the Malas, being the
biggest beneficiaries among all the Dalit castes, have been
opposing this demand. It has made an impact in our campus
too, which gets reflected through two separate Dalit
students’ groups working in the campus. In 1994, the
Ambedkar Students’ Association (ASA) was the lone Dalit
Feb - Mar 2009 INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES
Interview
students’ group, which all the Dalit students were part of,
irrespective of their caste backgrounds. It was then
decided by the senior student members that ASA, to avoid
any division, would not participate in any activities
pertaining to the classification issue outside the campus.
But it was observed that some of the functionaries from
the Mala caste were actively promoting the activities of
Mala Mahanadu (an organization of Mala caste) to oppose
the demands for classification among the Dalits. Our
Madiga seniors felt that by doing so, they had broken
their promise. Besides, they also felt the need of forming a
separate students’ organization for Madiga students to
support the demand for classification. Then Dalit Student
Union (DSU) was formed.
As you said that DSU was formed for Madiga students,
then why did you choose to use the term ‘Dalit’ instead of
‘Madiga’ to name your organization?
It is true that our organization takes stands with Madiga
perspective but we do not have any problems in including
other Dalit students also with us. Some of our founder
members wanted to name it as ‘Madiga Students Union’
but the others thought that it was not good to exclude
other Dalits who wanted to join us, so we decided for Dalit
Students Union.
Apart from Malas and Madigas there are other numerous
small castes within Dalit community. What are the options
for students coming from these castes?
Many of such students join Ambedkar Students Union.
In fact many Madiga students are also active in ASA and
it is not a problem with us. Here, I will like to make myself
very clear that we treat ASA as our mother organization
and apart from the classification issue we stand united.
Earlier, our seniors used to tell us that ASA was Mala-
dominated organization and Madiga students were not
given much space. But when, we, the younger generation
took the leadership we are telling our juniors that ASA is
for all the Dalits and DSU is for the Madigas.
Since last few years, the classification issue has assumed
much importance in the Dalit struggle in Andhra Pradesh.
We have also witnessed its impact on Dalit student’s
politics here. What is this issue all about?
39
The constitutional provision of reservation for SC/STs
has benefited lots of Dalits. However, unfortunately, the
benefits have been limited to certain castes only, the castes
that are dominant among Dalits. If the reservation is not
classified/categorized then all the benefits of reservation
will be restricted to these dominant castes only so in order
to spread the benefits of reservation to each and every
Dalit castes it is must to provide reservation on the basis
of the population of each of the Dalit caste. In Andhra
Pradesh, apart from Madigas and Malas there are 57 other
castes that are included in the SC list. Recently we had
done a survey in University of Hyderabad about the
representation of Dalit communities since last ten years.
We found that only students from 13 Dalit castes got
admission here. Even among them the number of Malas
and Madigas were much high. What about the students
from rest of the castes? The categorization is not the issue
between Mala-Madiga alone but it should be done, so
that the benefits of reservation would reach to each castes.
With the rise of Madiga politics, Jagjivan Ram has
emerged as Dalit icon in Andhra Pradesh. It is little
surprising, as he never attained that stature in North
India. There he remained a great Dalit politician but never
became an icon of the emancipatory Dalit politics.
Yes it is true. Madigas accepted Jagjivan Ram as one of
their icons probably because he was from similar Chamar
caste but they have not done that at the cost of rejecting
Babasaheb Ambedkar. We follow both Babasaheb and
Jagjivan Ram.
But in north India where the Dalit movement is led by
Chamars, Jagjivan Ram is not considered as an Icon.
May be but we believe that Babasaheb Ambedkar gave us
the Constitution but Jagjivan Ram implemented it. He
successfully led many important ministries where he did
his best to continue the policy of Babasaheb Ambedkar.
That is quite a unique explanation! Anyways, coming back
to student’s politics in the campus. Since its inception,
DSU has been fighting elections for the student union.
How has been the journey so far?
Since 1996 we are fighting University elections and have a
fair amount of success in getting our candidates elected.
Earlier, our seniors had a pact with a right wing students
group called ‘Discovery’, just in order to remain in the
contest but later with the change in the leadership of DSU
it was decided not to have any kind of pact with such
groups. Since 2002, DSU has fought most of the elections
in alliance with Ambedkar Students Union. Together we
had alliances with Left students group also. But the
experience has not been a nice one. Left students group
had betrayed us several times. They align with us out of
electoral compulsions and perceive Dalit students group
40 INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES
as threats to their existence. In the rustication case of ten
Dalit students (2002), Left supported the University
administration and we would never forget that.
Recently there has been some huge controversy in the
campus regarding putting up of beef-food stalls in the
University Cultural Fest by the Dalit students. What is
your opinion?
It is unfortunate that the University administration and
upper-caste chauvinist students are opposing the beef-
food stalls set up by the Dalit students. We are beef-eaters.
Beef has been part of Dalit food culture in South India. We
have grown up on beef. When anybody can eat chicken,
fish, mutton etc. openly in this country why can’t we eat
our food. They should respect our food culture. We want
to resist this brahminical cultural hegemony. In the cultural
fest, students from different region and culture put up
their food stalls. For example every year we have Bengali,
Keralite, Northeastern and other region-based food stalls.
It is not just about food. It is about showcasing your
culture before the campus. Similarly we also thought of
displaying our Dalit culture by putting up beef-food stalls.
So we took permission from the university administration
to open beef stall and then only we put up our stall.
But there was lot of opposition?
The beef stall was huge success. Lots of people
came and ate. Later some students from Akhil Bhartiya
Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) came and asked us to stop our
stall. We refused. Then they forced the administration to
withdraw the permission. We simply stated our position
that beef has been part of our food and nobody has the
right to deny us. Most of the Dalit students started keeping
vigil around the stall so that administration could not
forcefully evict us. The administration applied every trick
on us- they threatened us, cajoled us but we remained
firm. That was in 2006. However, the unity of Dalit students
prevailed and we ran our stall successfully. We hope that
in future, we will be able to run our stall successfuly.
‘Upper’ castes students also came to your stall to eat beef?
Of course, our beef stall was the most successful
one. The demand was so much that we were unable to
provide enough beef packets. Not only Dalits but also
many other students from Muslims, Christians, Northeast
also used to visit our stall. Beef has been part of their food
habits also but they are denied that due to ‘upper’ caste
chauvinism in this country. But we were surprised by huge
number of ‘upper’ caste students visiting our stall. Though
many of them did not wanted others to know about their
eating beef. Then we realized that most of the ‘upper’ caste
students eat beef and the ABVP is just trying to get political
mileage and don’t want to loose the opportunity to assert
their socio-cultural hegemony on usŸ
Feb - Mar 2009

Manual Scavenging and the Legal Discourse
Through the Lens
of Pollution
by Saptarshi Mandal
A
lot is being written about
these days in newspapers,
popular magazines and
academic journals on manual
scavenging. While all these writings
highlight the failure of the law in
abolishing manual scavenging and
liberate the Dalits who are forced to
clean human excreta with their hands,
there seems to be an uncritical view
of the law itself as a mode of liberation.
There seems to be a feeling that if
only the law had been implemented
in the right spirit, we might have seen
an end to the practice of manual
scavenging.
Such an uncritical, sanitized
view of law however, presupposes the
law as an autonomous institution,
divorced from the existing social
relations. It needs to be recognized
that the relationship between the law
and the manual scavengers has a
long history of confrontation, control
and coercion.
One needs to take a long hard
look at the law and the legal discourse
around manual scavenging and ask
whether law could at all serve the ends
of a radical anti-caste politics leading
to justice for and liberation of the of
the manual scavengers.
In this article, I propose to
dwell on this question by exploring
Feb - Mar 2009
Photo Courtesy Frontline
Bounded by caste, customs and traditions, the
Dalits involved in manual scavenging find no legal
recourse despite the enactment of law prohibiting
the practice. A close reading of the law reveals that
the state also never intended to do so.
three sites of interaction between
manual scavenging and the legal
discourse.
Within the ambit of
‘Essential Services’
‘In the tropics, cleanliness was as
important to the British as loyalty’,
writes Vijay Prashad in his account
of the manual scavengers of Delhi
(Untouchable Freedom: Social
History of a Dalit Community, pp 2).
The central aspect of the colonial
governance policy in India was to
restructure urban life by making the
cities clean and out of reach of the
dreaded epidemics.
However, despite the efforts
and 'a most laudable zeal in this work
of sanitary improvement' by the
municipal bodies, regular and timely
removal of garbage remained
confined to only those areas of the
city where the British stationed. Lest
the inhabitants of the old city
(reference is to Old Delhi here) whose
INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES
unsanitary conditions were not
attended to, should rise up to another
revolt against the unequal civic
amenities, the colonial masters
blamed it on the sweepers'
inefficiency.
Every house in a locality used
to be serviced by a particular sweeper.
Additionally, there was an informal
agreement of service between the
householder and the sweeper, which,
in addition to the monthly wages,
entitled him to receive leftover food
on a daily basis and money during
ritual occasions. Since contact with
filth threatened the notion of ritual
purity of both the Hindus and
Muslims, the householders seldom
offended the sweepers. This allowed
the sweepers some bargaining power
- albeit limited - within the structure
of subordination, which gave them a
sense of economic security and
dignity.
However, this irked the colonial
officers who exaggerated this limited
41
power and independence of the story of how the colonial legal Services' and whom they were not
sweeper in order to justify the discourse worked in favour of the prepared to release except on one
administration's taking over of the prevailing Hindu social order in month's notice. While the Indian
cleaning duties and tying them to the retaining the status quo, it was the government tried to secure safe
administration through fixed wages. legal discourse of the independent passage for the 'Hindus' of Pakistan,
The sweeper was thus portrayed as a Indian State, that cemented the Dalit's there was no concern about the Dalits
'tyrant', who holds the entire urban association with filth by invoking the left behind in Pakistan. Dr. Ambedkar
community to ransom depending on language of 'essential services'. raised this issue in a letter to Prime
his whims. The Essential Services Minister Jawaharlal Nehru in
Another aspect of the Maintenance Ordinance (ESMO) had December 1947. However, it is not
municipality's move to appropriate its origin during the Second World known what came out of his
the labour process surrounding the War, when it was deployed to ensure concerned intervention.
cleaning of the city was that the the smooth running of the war Once again the national polity
sweeper was an 'irreplaceable worker', economy. When the sanitation got a chance to decide the fate of the
who supported the entire Photo Courtesy Getty images
edifice of sanitary
administration with cheap
labour. Despite the gradual
mechanization of the system
of disposal of filth, what kept
the 'modern' mechanized
system running was the
manual labour of the
sweepers of the municipality.
It would not be too
erroneous to argue that the
economic considerations of
the colonial masters were
influenced by the native caste
relations. In the native
consciousness, the Dalit,
being the embodiment of
pollution, was hardly human
to be accorded any dignity and
therefore it wouldn't unsettle
the native sentiments if the Dalits were The economic considerations of the colonial masters
used as a cheap substitute for a capital- were influenced by the native caste relations. In the
intensive sanitation technology.
native consciousness, the Dalit, being the embodiment
The authority of law was used of pollution, was hardly human to be accorded any dignity
to tighten the administration's hold
on the sweepers, who were gradually workers of Delhi went on a strike in manual scavengers when the ESMO
becoming servants of the 1943, they were arrested and returned bill was taken up for discussion in
municipality. Under section 118 of Act to their workplace. In 1947, the the Lok Sabha in 1957 in response to
XX of 1891, the municipality could provisions of the ESMO were the strikes of manual scavengers
prosecute any sweeper who incorporated in the Industrial across various municipalities of the
neglected his statutory duties. This Disputes Act. country. The Dalit's escape from the
meant in effect, that the sweepers During the Partition, the new caste-based division of labour was
could not go on a strike to protest State of Pakistan refused to allow the legally barred, when the ESMO was
against any decision of the 'untouchables' involved in sanitation passed by 226 votes to 51. In 1965,
administration, for that would be a work to immigrate to India, as the the ESMO was given a longer leash
neglect of his statutory duties. government had declared the of life when the Supreme Court of
While the foregoing is the sweepers as belonging to 'Essential India opined that ESMO did not

42 INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES Feb - Mar 2009

restrict the freedoms of speech,
expression or association and held
therefore, that there was no
fundamental right to strike.
Scavenging & Customary
Rights
The discourse of 'Customary Rights'
arose in the 1960s following the report
of the second Malkani Committee,
which sought to provide effective
solutions to the 'Customary Rights
to Scavenging'. The Committee
considered the question, whether the
right to clean human excreta and
dispose it was a customary right. And,
if indeed it was so, whether it could
be considered to be a right to property
under the Indian Constitution.
The second question was
relevant - legally speaking - for the
simple reason that, if the right to
manual scavenging was a right to
property, then the practice of manual
scavenging could not be abolished
without paying due compensation to
the scavengers as is required by the
Constitution.
Manual scavenging was
thought of as similar to property due
to several reasons: for one, over
time it had become a hereditary
practice, where the children
continued in the parents' place as
manual scavengers in a particular
house or locality.
Secondly, there was an
unwritten agreement between the
householder and the scavenging
family, whereby members of that
family alone could provide services
to the former. Thirdly, the family
collecting the refuse could sell the
refuse (as manure) thereby
supplementing the family income.
Finally, these 'rights' could be sold
or mortgaged by the family holding
them, just like
property.
The Dalit's escape from the caste-based division of
The Com-
mittee labored
labour was legally barred, when the ESMO was passed
in Lok Sabha by 226 votes to 51
hard to find
Feb - Mar 2009
evidence for the existence of such consensus between the claimants of
'customary rights'. The Committee later rights and the subject matter of the
concluded that due compensation rights. Three, customary rights relate
could not be paid to the manual to crucial questions of livelihood.
scavengers, in accordance with the And four, to be legally recognized,
Constitutional scheme, on abolition of customary rights should not only be
the practice. This was so, because the ancient and certain, they should be
Committee found that the evidence reasonable as well.
was not 'clear and unambiguous' When the language of
enough - as required by the law - to customary rights is invoked and
support such a claim. Nevertheless, it advocated in the context of the
did recognize that such customary manual scavengers, it stealthily reads
rights existed and that they were 'an in the 'consent' of the scavengers to
extension of the traditional rural the system that degrades them and
jajmani system'. robs them of their dignity. It must be
Although, if recognized as remembered that those involved in
customary rights with clear and manual scavenging do not take up
unambiguous evidence, it would have the job by choice. The language of
meant economic benefits to the customary rights masks the power
manual scavengers, I find the trope and coercion involved in the process
of 'customary rights' problematic for of marking certain bodies as unclean
several reasons. One, customary and then assigning them the most
rights are invoked by communities to degrading of tasks that perpetuate
assert their rights in natural resources. their association with 'pollution'.
For example, right to use forest What is more, it also tends to
products or right to fishing in tanks underplay the institutional and legal
etc. Two, the language of customary patronage accorded to this system of
rights suggests the existence of a coercion. And finally, the debate
transforms to one on the existence
of 'evidence' and 'compensation'
rather than question the inherent
legality or morality of the practice of
manual scavenging.
Employment of Manual
Scavengers and Dry
Latrines (Prohibition) Act
In 1993, the State enacted the
Employment of Manual Scavengers
and Dry Latrines (Prohibition) Act.
The stated objective of the
legislation is to 'enact a uniform law
for the whole of India for abolishing
manual scavenging by declaring
employment of manual scavengers
for removal of human excreta an
offence and thereby ban the further
proliferation of dry
latrines in the
country'. The law
recognizes that the
practice of manual
INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES 43

One primary reason
why the law has not
led the process of
liberation of the
manual scavengers is
that the implications of
the notion of
'pollution' have not
been recognized by
the legal discourse
scavenging, which continues
unabated in major parts of the country
is indeed 'dehumanising'.
However, a closer reading of the
law reveals two aspects: one, that the
legislative intent is more towards
improvement of urban sanitation and
public health rather than liberation of
the manual scavengers; and two, that
the law does not provide for an
absolute abolition of manual
scavenging.
Section 3(1) of the Act directs
that the State Government 'may'
declare by notification in a particular
area that no person shall employ
another for the purpose of manual
scavenging and that no person shall
construct or maintain a dry latrine.
The next sub-clause however, waters
down the absolute prohibition
suggested by the foregoing clause,
by adding that the State Government
'shall' issue a notification to the
above-mentioned effect, only if
(a) it has issued another notification
at least ninety days before, declaring
its intention to prohibit manual
scavenging;
(b) there are adequate facilities for
the use of water-seal latrines in that
44
Photo Courtesy Frontline
Manual Scavengers protest demanding the deomolition of dry latrine in Kurnool
area; and
(c) it is necessary or expedient to do
so for the protection and improvement
of the environment or public health
in that area.
Three points may be noted
here: one, the use of the word 'may' in
the first clause and 'shall' in the
second clause reveals the differential
sense of priority and urgency in the
legal intent. Two, the word 'and' in
clause 3(1)(b) suggests that for the
State Government to issue
notification, all the three conditions
have to be fulfilled. And three, the
State Government can issue
notification based on considerations
of protection of environment and
danger to public health, but liberation
of the manual scavengers from an
undervalued and degraded task may
not be a concern pressing enough!
Additionally, the State
Government is empowered to declare
any area exempt from the application
of the Act, upon any such condition
as it may think fit. It seems that the
Act was spearheaded by the ministry
of urban development and passed in
the interest of urban sanitation,
fuelled by international concerns, and
INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES
less because of concern for the
manual scavengers.
Through the Lens of
Pollution
One of the major aspects of the Dalit's
situation of marginality and exclusion
is her association with the notion of
ritual 'pollution' accruing from her
engagement with the so-called
'unclean' occupations. Certain
occupations - mostly associated with
death and human bodily waste - are
regarded as unclean and degraded
and therefore assigned to those
considered to be outside the pale of
humanity. In fact, the link between the
Dalit as embodying pollution and the
polluting occupations follows a
circular logic: Why are the jobs
polluting? Because they are
performed by Dalits. Why are the
Dalits polluting? Because they
perform polluting jobs.
It is this association with ritual
pollution, and the stigma and
discrimination resulting thereof, that
sets apart Dalits from the other
deprived groups or 'have-nots' in the
Indian society. And it is this
association with ritual pollution that
Feb - Mar 2009
is invoked to explain and justify the
sub-human status assigned to the
Dalits by the caste system.
One primary reason why the
law has not led the process of
liberation of the manual scavengers
is that the implications of the notion
of 'pollution' have not been
recognized by the legal discourse. In
fact, as we have seen throughout this
paper, the discourse of sanitation and
public health is continuously used to
black out the caste-implications of the
process through which the State
provides sanitation facilities.
Thus, we see in several cases,
the Courts direct the State authorities
to undertake specific measures like
construction of extra public latrines
and regular cleaning of them, in order
to protect human health and
sanitation under Article 21 of the
Constitution. However these
judgments have seldom dwelt on the
question of rights of those Dalits who
are employed to clean them manually.
Need of Dalit
Jurisprudence
As I have shown in this paper, the
law is neither an unbiased arbiter of
human disputes, nor is it a neutral
assigner of roles and responsibilities
of the people that it regulates. The
presumptions and operation of the
law are informed by the existing caste
relations and the corresponding
power relations in the society, which
ensure that the law, instead of
breaking, further entrench the status-
quo.
More than twenty years back,
in a short article, Prof. N.S.
Chandrasekharan had urged the
Indian judges and legal academics to
develop, what he termed as a Dalit
Jurisprudence, which could guide the
manner in which justice may be
delivered to the Dalits.
Chandrasekharan argued that the
legal formulations devised for
empowering Dalits needed 'something
more' than the already existing vision
of social justice that one found in the
Indian Constitution.
In the specific context of the
State's attempts at the abolition of
manual scavenging, that 'something
more' would be recognizing the ideology
of 'pollution'. As and when such a theory
of Dalit Jurisprudence emerges, it must
squarely address the question of
'pollution' within the legal dynamics Ÿ

Saptarshi Mandal (saptarshi.nujs@gmail.com) is studying Law at the National University of Juridical Sciences
(NUJS), Kolkata

A Man Dies Cleaning Sewer in Chennai, Despite High Court Ban

On 20th November 2008, the Madras High court passed a landmark Judgment, banning the entry of any human
beings into the sewer manholes and septic tanks. It also asked the state government to file an action taken report on
its compliance with the court order. On 4th January 2009, the Chennai metrowater Chairman publicly affirmed that no
worker was being used to clean sewer lines and septic tanks and they would be filing the report in the court before
15th January. There was nothing surprising in such statements from the government officials, as it is a common
knowledge now, about how the various governments have been lying about the prevalance of manual scavenging
in their states and thus blocking the path towards the eradication of manual scavenging.
This denial of existence of manual scavenging in Chennai got exposed just three days after the Chairman made the
statement. Unfortunately, on 7th January, one life was lost while cleaning the sewer manhole in North Chennai.
Mr.Ettiappan, aged 50, who went to clean the sewer line along with two other workers, died inside the sewer line.
However, the government officials quickly tried to disown any responisibilty, proving that a Dalit life is much
cheaper and also that they are not bothered by the law of the land.
The news of Ettiappan’s death was not able to get any media coverage as the entire state media was only intreseted
in covering the controversial Assembly by-election in Tamilnadu due to which, it might now again become easy for
the government officials to hoodwink the courts on the issue of manual scavenging.
It has now become imperative for the Indian civil society to initiate action against the guilty officials and also to
unite and work, both at micro as well as national level, against manual scavenging, which is even worse than
slavery. We owe it to Ettiappan and his now orphaned family.

With inputs from Narayanan A., PAADAM

Feb - Mar 2009 INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES 45

Tamilnadu
Caste Violence in
Ambedkar Law College
Based on the fact-finding report by a committee of noted
academicians and human right activists namely Dr A. Marx, K.
Palanisamy, Rajini, Thai. Kandasamy, Kesavan, Sujatha,
Manoharan, Dr P. Sivakumar, Dr K. Santhosham, Prof J. Lenin,
C. Jerome Samraj, R. Revathi and Raghavan.
The whole country was shocked to see the visuals
of student clash that happened on 12th November, at the
Dr. Ambedkar Law College, Chennai. The fact that these
clashes have taken caste lines, seeks extra concern. Based
on the repeated telecasts in the visual media, the general
understanding amongst public is that of particular
community students conducting a heinous attack on
another community students. From a lay viewpoint, this
seems like the actual truth but this is just a half-truth. This
issue has much deeper roots.
The clashes between the students from Dr.
Ambedkar Law College have been happening for many
years now. In this context, a thevar caste (one of the
dominant castes of Tamilnadu) organization Mukkulathor
Manavar Peravai (Mukkulathor Student Organization)
was formed in the Law College. This outfit celebrates
October 30th as Thevar Jeyanthi on Muthuramalinga
Thevar’s birth anniversary. In all the posters and pamphlets
printed for this function, apart from inclusion of casteist
slogans, the name of the Dr.Ambedkar Law College is
always truncated to Chennai Law College. This has created
a feeling of hurt and anger in the minds of the Dalit students
studying in the college.
The same thing was repeated this year also, in
posters prepared for Thevar Jeyanthi. According to
Mukkulathor Student Organization, some Dalit students,
infuriated at the removal of Dr. Ambedkar from the name of
the Law College, tore away a few of these posters. Dalit
students claim that they did not tear the posters but only
questioned about the deletion. However, there was some
altercation that took place between the two groups. As a
result, some thevar students issued warnings to the Dalit
students, not to sit for the coming exams. Bharathi Kannan
and Arumugam, both having a criminal past of assaulting
Dalit students, were the main instigators.
The exams started on November 5th and many Dalit
students didn’t appear for exams, out of the fear. Just after
two days, 4 Dalit students, on way to examination halls,
were brutally assaulted by a group of students led by
46 INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES
Bharathi Kannan and Arumugam. On 12th November, again
Bharathi Kannan and his group assembled in the campus
and tried to create terror among the Dalit students by
openly brandishing knives and choppers, threatening
them not to sit for the exams. Hearing that Dalit students
are being threatened and stopped from writing exams,
around 40 hostellers, mostly Dalits, armed with sticks
arrived at the college. These students clearly told the
college administration that they had come there to protect
Dalit students so that they were able to sit for exams and
had no intention of doing violence in the campus.
However little later, the situation became worse as
the Bharathi Kannan and Arumugam, both armed with
knives, pounced on one Dalit student Chithirai Selvan.
Seeing him fall with heavy injuries on his head enraged
Dalit students and they caught both of them. We saw on
the visual media that the two were beaten up badly after
their knives fell to the ground. The police despite being
present on the spot did not take any effort to stop the
violence or disperse the students.
Three cases have been registered after the
November 12th incident. In this, so far 23 Dalit students
have been arrested. Injured Chithirai Selvan has also been
arrested. A case against Bharathi Kannan and Arumugam
has also been registered but none has been arrested.
Preventing students from writing their exams have far
reaching implications on the students’ life and career.
Neither the college administration nor the professors could
confirm the number of Dalit students who could not write
their exams, due to the threatening by the other students’
group.
The violence of November 12 th is strongly
condemnable but it should not be seen just in the context
of that day’s incidents. It should be seen in the context of
the series of events that have taken place in the campus.
The action taken by the local administration is also one
sided. Every Dalit student who came across has been
arrested. Gokul Raj, a student totally unconnected to the
incident and who is not even a student of the Dr.Ambedkar
Law College has also been arrested Ÿ
Feb - Mar 2009

The following report was published in a Bengali Newspaper Ananda Bazaar Patrika, Friday, 30th May
2008. We are grateful to Saptarshi Mandal from National University of Juridical Sciences, Kolkata for its
translation in English
I
s Biman Basu going to arrange a
communal dinning at the Calcutta
Medical College?
A few years back, the school
students of Birbhaanpur in Bankuda
district had boycotted the mid-day
meals cooked by ‘low’ caste women.
It was said that they had been
instructed to do so by their family
members. The Left-Front chairman
Mr. Biman Basu had gone there and
had organized a communal dinning
with all the caste members, thus
saving the state government from
much embarrassment.
This time around, there have
been allegations that some students
at the Calcutta Medical College hostel
have been prevented from taking
water from the taps, on account of
their ‘low’ caste by their ‘high’ caste
classmates. For the same reason, the
said students have been subjected
to physical and mental torture also. It
is surprising, that all those who were
so vociferous against the divisive
nature of ‘caste-based’ reservations,
should have such cases of blatant
untouchability in their own
backyards!
Seventeen students of the first
and second years, who are residents
of the men's hostel at the college have
expressed their grievances in writing,
to the Dean Mr. Prabir Kumar Dasgupta
and Hospital Superintendent, Mr.
Anup Roy. In their written account, the
Feb - Mar 2009
The Caste Ailment Strikes
the Calcutta Medical College Hostel
aggrieved students have said that for
the past few days, a group of students
at the men's hostel had been abusing
and taunting them on caste lines. The
situation took a serious turn on the
night of 17th May, when a group led
by three students entered the hostel
and started abusing the Dalit students
on caste lines and warned them against
taking water from the taps. When the
latter protested, they were dragged out
of their rooms and beaten up by the
mob. The aggrieved students
approached the authorities, in order to
seek redressal against such violence.
The authorities and the
doctors at the Medical College are
extremely upset about this kind of
caste-based disturbances within the
hostel. On 19th May, the Hospital
Superintendent, after making primary
enquiries, constituted a committee
comprising of four departmental
heads, for conducting detailed
investigations into the matter. The
committee comprised of Dr. Siddharth
Chakravarty of the Cardio-Thoracic
Department, Dr. Sukanto Chatterjee
of the Pediatrics Department, Dr.
Tapan Kumar Basu of Forensic
Medicine and Dr. Samir Dasgupta of
Community Medicine.
After investigations, the
committee is more or less certain that
the incident had, indeed occurred.
However, since the situation at the
Medical College is perpetually tensed
INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES
West Bengal
surrounding matters related to the
hostels, the committee fears that the
submission of the report would
amount to adding fuel to the fire. The
students, against whom the
allegations have been made, have
however denied that the incident ever
took place.
In the words of superintendent
Mr. Anup Roy, "this incident has
given me a mental shock. I am
somehow not being able to accept
such mentality and attitude of the
students of the medical college. We
have requested every student
organization on the campus to
monitor that such shameful incidents
do not take place in future".
The members of the
investigation committee informed,
that in order to test the validity of the
allegations, all the seventeen
aggrieved students were asked to
write down their accounts of the
incident, separately, in front of the
committee. It was seen that all the
seventeen students wrote similar
descriptions. The committee members
stated, "Our report is complete. It is
extremely demotivating. But given
the turbulent situation at the medical
college caused by the student
movement, we really don't know what
would happen when we release the
report. And it is such considerations
that are preventing us from submitting
the report" Ÿ
47

Celebrating the Birth Anniversary of M C Rajah
by Iyothee Thassar Thinkers Circle
O
n 22nd June, Iyothee
Thassar Thinkers Circle
(ITTC), an academic forum
of research scholars and faculty
members, celebrated 125th birth
anniversary of Rao Bahadur Mylai
Chinnathambi Rajah (popularly
known as M C Rajah) by organizing
a memorial lecture in Chennai.
Dr. Armstrong (lecturer,
University of Madras) and renowned
writer Gautham Sanna delivered the
lectures reflecting upon the vision
and contributions of this great Dalit
leader of the early 20th century.
Rao Bahadur MC Rajah was a
great political activist, educational
philanthropist, parliamentarian,
statesman who played a major role in
liberation of ex-untouchables in Tamil
Nadu and outside. He was an
associate of Babasaheb Ambedkar
and together represented the
concerns of ex-untouchables at
national level and made immense
efforts towards organizing them to
fight for their political, social and
economic rights.
He organized number of
meetings and conferences demanding
abolition of untouchability as well as
basic rights for Dalits like land rights,
housing rights, access to public wells,
pathways to burial grounds, primary
health care, mid-day meals for primary
students and compensatory
allowance for Dalit parents for
admitting wage-earning children to
schools. He organized the Dalit
community in Madras presidency
through forming co-operative
societies. He was also a staunch
votary of proper representation of ex-
48
M.C. Rajah (1883-1943)
untouchables in state councils, local
bodies and public services.
He propagated the terms ‘Adi-
Dravida and Adi-Andhra’ for
bringing all Dalit castes together in
South India and to mark their
differences with the caste-hindus in
the historical context by terming
Dalits as the original inhabitants of
the country. Later he reorganized
Adi-Dravida Mahajana Sabha in 1916
and used it as a platform for giving
Dalits a political voice.
In 1919, MC Rajah became the
first Dalit leader of the country to be
nominated as the member of any state
legislative council. Recognizing his
immense contribution and leadership
towards ex-untouchables he was
nominated for four consecutive terms
as a member of Madras Legislative
Council. He used this opportunity for
articulating the problems faced by
Dalits in Madras presidency and
INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES
Tamilnadu
secured their various social and
educational rights. Further, in 1928,
he was also nominated to the
Provincial Council.
His services to Dalits in the
field of education are immense.
Himself a born teacher, he was also a
teacher-trainer and an educational
philanthropist. He was responsible
for establishing a Dravidian School
in 1936 at Nungambakkam. To counter
untouchability practices in
educational institutions he built
hostels for Dalit students and secured
scholarships for them. With
community's support he also initiated
various night schools, gymnastic
clubs and training centers for widows
for teaching women students.
Recognizing his vast contribution in
the field of Education for marginalized
sections British government
nominated him for various
committees of Education Department.
In 1925, he wrote a book titled
‘The Oppressed Hindus’ reflecting on
the present conditions of Dalits and
their issues using proper statistics.
He also outlined the glorious past of
ex-untouchables and their pioneering
contributions in the fields of
literature, astronomy, astrology,
medicine etc. Using historical tools
available he claimed present Dalits to
be the aboriginal inhabitants of the
country having a well-developed
civilization with democratic form of
governance.
Later in the same book, he
argued for proper representation of
the Dalit community in government
positions as the best possible
solution against casteist prejudices
Feb - Mar 2009
prevalent in the society. Apart from
this book, he also contributed in the
preparation of numerous school and
college textbooks during his tenure
as a teacher-trainer at Saidapet
Teacher Training College and as a
lecturer in Voorhees College, Vellore.
In his lecture, Dr. Armstrong
located the contributions of MC
Rajah towards the Dalit liberation vis-
à-vis the vision of Bhakti radicals like
Raidas and scholar-revolutionaries
like Iyothee Thassar, Jotiba Phule and
Babasaheb Ambedkar.
While Bhakti radical Raidas
(c1450-1520) envisioned
‘Begumpura’, a city without sorrow,
a casteless & classless society
without any mention of the temples.
An urban society in contrast to
Gandhi's village utopia of Ram-
Rajjya, Begumpura is a land with no
taxes, harassment or hierarchy. Great
Dalit revolutionary Iyothee Thassar
desired a society that existed earlier
in Tamil Nadu in the form of a Sakya
Buddhist Commonwealth. Similarly,
Bhakti radicals namely Chokhamela,
Janabai, Nirmala, Soyra, Banka, Gora
Kumbhar, Kabir, and Tukaram
imagined for an egalitarian and
Celebrating Dalit History Month
Searching for the Past
by Iyothee Thassar and Ambedkar Research Scholars Forum
T he idea that the Dalits were
always deprived throughout the
history was challenged by a group of
young scholars in a meeting held on
April 19th, 2008. Iyothee Thassar and
Ambedkar Research Scholars Forum
(IARSF) organized this meeting as a
part of the celebration of 'Dalit History
Month' in Chennai.
P. Ponnuswamy, a research
scholar from the Department of Tamil,
University of Madras, introduced the
Feb - Mar 2009
democratic society. It was a land of
King Bali that was desired by
Mahatma Jothirao Phule for the
emancipation of the wretched of the
Indian society.
Dr. Armstrong argued that
these visions and dreams of social
revolutionaries were made realizable
by both MC Rajah and Babasaheb
Ambedkar through their boundless
efforts in the first half of 20th century.
Both the Dalit leaders wanted freedom
of Dalits from the clutches of hindu
imperialism through their own
collective and individual efforts.
In his lecture, Gautam Sanna
spoke about MC Rajah's effort to
organize the Dalits at national level
and his special relationship with
Babasaheb Ambedkar. In 1926, he
was elected as the first president of
the All India Depressed Classes
Association in the convention held
at Nagpur. Babasaheb Ambedkar, who
did not attend the conference, was
elected one of its vice-presidents.
However the difference between the
two leaders arose on the issues of
separate electorate and conversion.
During the round table
conferences, Babasaheb demanded
concept of 'Dalit History Month',
which he said, is inspired by the
'Black History Month' celebrated in
USA. Various Dalit groups from all
over the world are now observing
'Dalit History Month' in the month of
April every year to commemorate
Babasaheb's birth anniversary and to
generate
‘ discourse on the Dalit
history and culture.
Dr. P. Balamurugan, Lecturer in
History, emphasized the need for new
.
INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES
dual representation for Dalits in the
form of separate electorate whereas
MC Rajah supported joint electorate
system and subsequently joined
Gandhi's camp. There he got
nominated as a member of the
executive council in Harijan Sevak
Sangh. This confrontation with
Babasaheb also led MC Rajah to sign
a pact with BS Moonje, leader of All
India Hindu Mahasabha opposing his
demand of separate electorate for the
Dalit community. This pact is known
as Rajah-Moonje pact. He also
opposed Babasaheb's call for
conversion from Hindu religion at
Yeola conference in 1935.
But soon after he got
disllusioned with congress and
Gandhi as he found Harijan Sevak
Sangh to be a body of sychophants
of Gandhi and without any vision for
Dalit empowerment. MC Rajah
accepted his mistake and joined
hands with Babasaheb Ambedkar
once again. In 1942, both made a joint
presentation, considered as landmark
in the Dalit movement, in front of Sir
Stafford Cripps commission
demanding socio-political rights for
the Dalit community Ÿ
interpretations in writing/reading
history through Dalit perspectives.
Quoting studies on the
inscriptions of the Chola period, he
argued that Indian historians have
either ignored or failed to draw
obvious conclusions regarding the
references to the Dalit and other Sudra
castes found in such inscriptions. "It
is not unusual to find gaps in the
history as they are normally about an
episode, intentions or some
49
information. However, in Indian
history writing, it is not accidental
that a whole mass is missing from
the scene," he said.
He argued that many ancient
inscriptions have clearly mentioned
about various Sudra and
Untouchable castes, particularly in
context of Devadaayaa (Grants to
the Temple) and Brahmadana
(Donations to the Priest).
This shows that Dalits had
properties and many of them donated
lands to the religious bodies. It was
only during the late Chola period that
the Dalit castes were confined to
menial jobs and were dispossessed
due to enforcement of rigorous caste
regime.
Dr. K .Raghupathi, from
Manonmaniam Sundaranar University,
Tirunelveli, spoke about the changing
nature of Dalit leadership in erstwhile
Madras Province to post-Independent
Tamilnadu. Analyzing various
agitations and struggles led by Dalit
leaders and organizations, he
contended that the Dalit leadership in
pre-Independence period was much
militant and worked for fundamental
rights, while post-independence Dalit
leadership ended up being ineffective
and opportunistic.
Before independence, the Dalit
struggle in Madras province under
the leadership of Rettamalai
Srinivasan, MC Rajah and
Sahajaananda Swamigal was clearly
guided by a 'positive agenda' of
human rights and socio-economic
equality for the Dalit community.
However, the post-Independence
Dalit leadership has limited itself to
responding only towards successive
caste-based atrocities and Dalit
massacres.
Being part of a democratic
polity and having a constitution that
guarantees equal rights for the Dalits,
the leadership should have been
Both reports submitted by J. Balu, Madras Institute of Development Studies,Chennai.
50
doing their job much better. Such is
not the case and the present Dalit
leadership is completely devoid of any
positive agenda. It is a huge setback
for the community. According to Dr.
K. Raghupati, the root cause of such
decay in Dalit leadership lies in the
Poona Pact (1932), where Babasaheb
Ambedkar was forced to give away
his demand for separate electorate.
J. Balasubramaniam (PhD
scholar, Madras Institute of
Development Studies) traced the
history of one village
(Tiruppanikarisalkulam in Tirunelveli
district) and tried to explain the
complex relationship between land
and caste. He augmented his findings
with documentary evidences,
testimonies, village legends, folktales
and other narratives. According to
him, in late 19th century, the Dalits of
this village witnessed a political
renaissance due to their migration that
gave them huge exposure of external
world.
In early decades of 20th
century, some Dalits started investing
in constructing schools, libraries and
youth clubs for the benefit of the
community which eventually got
translated into political mobilisation
in the form of a vibrant Adi-Dravida
Mahajana Sabha. However little later,
this Dalit assertion was assimilated
by much younger but powerful
Dravidian Movement.
The conceptual notion of
Dravidian was actually proposed and
brought to circulation in the political
realm first by the Dalits but was taken
over by the resource-rich middle caste
groups. Then, the Dalit leadership
started calling themselves 'Adi-
Dravidas'. Later in his presentation,
J. Balasubramaniam stressed that the
Dalits in Tamil Nadu should now get
rid of the 'patronizing agenda' of the
Dravidian Movement
Another research scholar
INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES
Stalin Rajangam, working on the Dalit
history, spoke about the life and
struggle of a Dalit activist known as
Vanchinagaram Kandan in Melur.
The dominant caste people killed
Kandan, when he tried to fight against
the untouchability and other
discriminations in the 1980s. Today,
his memory is alive among everyone
and he has become a 'folk-god'. The
local Dalits have constructed a temple
in his memory that can be seen as
sign of increasing assertion from the
community.
Ratnamala, Ph.D scholar from
Communication Department, M.S.
University, Tirunelveli, spoke about
Thamirabarani Massacre, in which 17
Dalit laborers were brutally murdered
by the police in 1999. She narrated
about the media coverage given to
this gruesome incident. The, then,
newspaper reports were guilty of
distorting facts while reporting and
thus diluting the whole issue.
Scholar and writer G. Aloysius,
well known for bringing out the works
of Iyothee Thassar, presided over this
meeting. While commenting on the
need of such scholarly initiatives, he
appreciated the efforts of celebrating
Dalit History Month and said that
even highly funded academic
seminars in Delhi University and
Jawaharlal Nehru University do not
come out with such insightful and
multi-disciplinary perspectives on
history.
The exhibition of the
documents related to the Dalit history
was also displayed on this occasion.
It included copies of Assembly
debates, memorandums submitted by
our great leaders MC Rajah, R.
Srinivasan and minutes of the Adi-
Dravida Mahajana Sabha. The
meeting concluded with a
documentary screening on the life and
work of Iyothee Thassar made by Pari
Chezhiyan Ÿ
Feb - Mar 2009

Non-implementation of Reservations
Dalit Leader Files Case Against IIT MADRAS
O n 15th May, the Tamil Dalit
leader Thol Thirumavalavan
(President, Viduthalai Chiruthaikal
Katchi) filed a writ petition at Madras
High Court, seeking its intervention
against caste-based discrimination in
student admissions and faculty
recruitment undertaken by IIT
Madras administration.
According to the Dalit leader, the
IITs, since their inceptions, have
singularly failed to provide proper
representation to the SC/ST
community in admissions. Despite
being completely funded by the
Indian state, IITs have displayed their
complete recultance to adhere with
the constitutional norms of providing
22.5% reservations in admissions for
SC/ST students.
This fact can be verified by the
data about the total number of
students enrolled in the academic year
of 2004-05 in IIT Madras (see table).
The Deputy Registrar of IIT Madras,
provided this statistics to a researcher
seeking information for the Times
Higher Education Supplement,
London.
The total students on the rolls
of IIT Madras in the year 2004-2005
were 4687. However, the total number
of SC/ST students was only 562,
thus constituting only 11.9 % of the
total students. If the reservation for
SC/ST students had been followed
properly there would have been 1054
students from the reserved category.
The Dalit leader also rasied
serious questions about the
'preparatory courses' undertaken by
Feb - Mar 2009
Tamilnadu
IIT Administration for the
Dalit students, where a
limited number of SC/ST
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offered direct admission to
the undergraduate Students In IIT Madras (2004-05)
programs in the next
academic year. exam, she was asked to take up the
However, the reality is preparatory course in IIT Madras
otherwise. In the name of preparatory although she had scored brilliant 94
courses, the SC/ST students are per cent marks in Class XII. However,
segregated and their stay in IIT is at the end of the course in IIT Madras,
stigmatized as non-meritorious she was failed in one subject,
students. Though several lofty ideas Physics. She could not believe this
are given to back-up the existence of and went to National Commission for
this course, yet, not even once the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled
quota for SC/ST students had Tribes for redressal that forced IIT
completely filled. Above all, if the management for re-examination and
Dalit student fails in this course she/ many Dalit students got admitted
he is not allowed any re-examination,
after that.
or another attempt to re-do the course
and has to forfeit his/her seat secured According to Thol
in the IIT JEE. Thirumavalavan, the concept of
In fact, in 2001, Chennai-based preparatory course is an illegal
Dalit Media Network came out with a subversion of the reservation policy
report exposing the case of Sujee and there is also a strong need for
Teppal, an ST student who topped some kind of academic audit of IITs
the Andhra Pradesh common to be undertaken to ensure that these
entrance test (EAMCET) for institutions are not able to destroy
engineering in her category but the concept of social justice in such
instead wanted to pursue B.Tech from a blatant manner Ÿ
IIT. After clearing the IIT entrance
With inputs from Meena Kandasamy, Anna University, Chennai
INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES 51
 Maharashtra
No Casteism, No Molestation,
No Rapes; Only Killings
O n 24th September, after 16 month
long trial, the Bhandara district
and sessions court pronounced its
judgment on the case of Khairlanji
killings. Out of the 11 convicts, 6
have been awarded death sentence
due to their direct involvement in the
killings. Two of the convicts were
handed life imprisonment, whereas
rest 3 were acquitted due to the lack
of evidence against them.
The punishment awarded to
the killers have brought some relief
to the Dalit community, which was
quite agitated over the gruesome
killings of the four members of a Dalit
family. However, the sad part is,
despite a planned mob attack by
caste-hindus that led to the killings,
the court had ruled out the caste-
hatred angle, stating that there was
no evidence to that effect.
As a consequence, none of the
accused could be charged under the
Prevention of Atrocities on SC/ST Act
(1989). It has also refused the charges
of rape, even molestation by stating
the same reason of lack of evidence.
According to the honourable judge,
the naked bodies of the two Dalit
women were fished out of the canal
but there was nothing to prove that
the accused had removed their clothes
before ferrying their bodies in a bullock
cart, towards the canal. Thus, it had
declined to register the case under IPC
354(molestation). It seems that the
honourable court at least accepted the
killings, probably, because it could not
declare the dead bodies alive!
The Khairlanji village lies in the
52
Court’s Verdict on Khairlanji
Bhandara district of
n o r t h e a s t
Maharashtra. On
September 29, 2006,
a mob of about 50
caste-hindus
attacked the house
of Bhaiyyalal
Bhotmange and
killed his wife
Surekha (44 years),
daughter Priyanka
(18), sons Sudhir Hang till Death :
(21) and Roshan (23 and blind) in the
broad daylight.
According to the newspaper
reports, the village caste-hindus were
enraged as the Bhotmange family had
showed courage to resist their efforts
to grab some portion of agricultural
land that belong to Bhotmange’s. The
Bhotmange’s were one among very
few Dalit families of the village
dominated by caste-hindus, mostly
belonging to the kunbi caste. Apart
from the land issue, it seems that the
caste-hindu villagers were also
jealous as the Bhotmange family was
relatively better off than other Dalit
families and all the three children were
getting proper education. On top of
that, the Bhotmange’s, especially
Bhaiyyalal’s wife Surekha
Bhotmange, was bold enough to
testify against some caste-hindu
villagers in the local police station,
pertaining to the case of physical
assault on one of her relatives.
In the area, where one’s caste
denotes her social standing and also
prescribes her behaviour, the little
With inputs from Ratnesh Kumar, BANISS, Mhow
INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES
prosperous, assertive and
educationally forward Dalit
Bhotmange’s family was considered
deviant, threat to the caste hierarchy
and therefore insulting to the caste-
hindu sensibilities.
Therefore, almost the whole
village decided to attack this family to
maintain the sanctity of caste hierarchy.
According to the eyewitnesses, they
were first stripped naked, dragged from
Photos courtesy atrocitynews.wordpress.com
1. Ramu Dhande 2. Vishvanath Dhande
their hut to an open ground and were
beaten by a mob of about 50 people.
Rest of the villagers, including the
caste-hindu women, witnessed this
brutality, without interfering. Surekha
and Priyanka were gang-raped, and
tortured to death in full public view.
Then, both the sons were stabbed to
death with their private parts mutilated.
There could be no other reason,
apart from the caste hatred, that could
induce the brutal manner in which the
Bhotmange’s family was killed in the
broad daylight. The caste
composition of the mob, complicity
of the whole village, audacity of the
attack and the brutal execution of the
attack – these all are common
characteristics of any Dalit
massacres. It is indeed unfortunate
that, the honourable court was not
able to understand the true nature of
this caste-based killings. If such
incidents were treated as mere
criminal acts, devoid of any castiest
motivation, the Prevention of SC/ST
Atrocities Act would soon lose its all
relevance Ÿ
Feb - Mar 2009
 Jharkhand
Indian School of Mines University, Dhanbad

Jamadars: 2 out of 2
Sanitary Inspectors: 0 out of 2
A ccording to the letterhead of Indian School of Mines
University, Dhanbad, it has been "In service of the
Nation, since 1926". It is indeed a noble idea for any
Non-Teaching Total sanctioned Posts filled in Posts filled
Post Post by SCs in by STs
Group A 31 2 1
institution, to serve the nation. What better way to do so
by an institution, completely funded by public money, Group B 50 3 5
than to be inclusive, to reflect the diversity of the nation,
Guoup C 201 27 21
its citizenry. However, the problem starts when that
institution, in the name of serving the nation, becomes the
Table 1: Non-Teaching posts
monopoly of few.
Indian School of Mines University is one such SC/STs. Then for 31 Group A (non-teaching) posts, ISMU
institution. It is one of the oldest engineering/technical has been able to recruit only 2 SCs and 1 STs. This is the
institutes of the country. It was established in 1926, on case when the ISMU is constitutionally bound to provide
lines of Royal School of Mines, London, in the heart of 22.5 % positions to the SC/ST communities in all Group A,
mineral-rich belt-Jharkhand, by the then colonial B, C posts.
government of India and endorsed by Indian National One can very well imagine the magnitude of
Congress. Both the rulers and the contesting power of exclusion of SC/ST people from the ISMU's teaching posts
that time were unanimous on the need of such institute that does not, yet, come under the purview of Reservation
that could provide technical know-how to the nascent provisions for SC/STs. There are absolutely no surprise in
Indian mineral industry. store for us as this 83 year old institution, with all its good
Incidentally, Jharkhand is also a state, which has Name of the Total sanctioned Posts filled in Posts filled
one of the highest percentages of SC/ST population (28 Post Posts by SCs in by STs
% ST and 12 % SC) in the country. The identity of the Professor 20 - -
state is completely intertwined with the tribal identity.
Associate 46 01 -
However, ISMU is one institution, located in Jharkhand,
which belies this, through its conscious exclusion of both Professor
SC and STs from its rank and file. So one can find in ISMU Assistant 92 01 -
that both posts of Jamadar (manual scavenger) are held Professor
by SCs, though both posts are unreserved, whereas there Table 2: Teaching posts
are no SC/ST for the two post of sanitary inspector.
Similarly for the Group C posts, which is almost intention of serving the nation, has not been able to recruit
always filled up with locals in any institution and require even a single tribal (see table 2), who could be worthy of
less educational qualification, the positions held by SC/ teaching the students here and that too situated in
STs in ISMU does not reflect the local population profile. Jharkhand.
Out of total 201 Group C posts, SC/ST people held 38, ISMU has been very 'generous' of recruiting two SC
making it 19 % of the total (see table 1). It is far below than persons as its faculty against total 158 faculty positions,
stipulated 22.5 % SC/ST reservations, leave alone reflecting making complete mockery of the nation that it claims to
40 % of state population. serve. It is shame that ISMU has failed to recruit more SC/
The situation becomes worse as we move towards STs for its teaching positions, though hundreds of
higher echelons of ISMU. There are 50 posts of Group B students from these communities might have graduated
employees in ISMU, out of which only 8% are filled by from the very same institute in its 83 years of existenceŸ
With inputs from Dr. Lal Chand Prasad, Benaras Hindu University, Varanasi

Feb - Mar 2009 INSIGHT-YOUNG VOICES 53

54 INSIGHT-YOUNGVOICES Feb - Mar 2009