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An Untouchable Subject?
Indian Government Wants
Caste System off U.N. Agenda
http://www.npr.org
Aug. 29, 2001 -- In India's crowded cities, where you can't help
but rub up against strangers, it's possible to be an
"untouchable," and yet go largely unnoticed -- and unhated. It's
a different story in the villages, however. There, where the majority of
the population still lives, India's ancient caste system still holds sway.
Many villages are strictly segregated by caste, and the untouchables -- or
Dalits -- are often forbidden to drink from upper-caste wells or to
worship at their temples.
Gandhi called them the Harijan -- or God's children. More than 50 years
ago, India outlawed discriminating against them. Nearly 20 percent of the
seats of India's parliament are reserved for them. Government jobs and
places in India's schools are also reserved for them. Despite all this,
discrimination still persists.
But
is discrimination by caste the same as racism? The Indian government says
no, and has objected to it's being brought up at the UN Conference Against
Racism in Durban, South Africa.
But activists and human-rights groups insist that, even if discrimination
against the Dalits is intra-racial, the effects are nevertheless the same.
There are about 160 million Dalits in India. In Hinduism's caste system,
they are the lowest of the low, having been assigned at birth to their
social status. Dalits are outside the four main caste divisions in India:
the priestly, or scholarly, caste; the warrior caste; the merchants; and
finally, the laborers. The Dalits are considered "untouchable"
because their status often doomed them to menial jobs that included
handling human waste and animal carcasses. Many of them are also doomed to
a life of ill treatment.
Some activists believe the government's wish to avoid heavy-handed
enforcement of anti-discrimination laws is the reason the government wants
caste off the table in Durban. If the conference takes up the issue,
"they will then be forced to take on a much more affirmative action
program than what they have been doing so far," says Ravi Nair of the
South Asia Human Rights Documentation Center.
Indian Attorney General Soli Sorabjee insists that the only reason India
wants caste discrimination kept off the agenda is that it will distract
participants from the main topic: racism. Caste discrimination in India is
"undeniable," he says, "but caste and race are entirely
distinct."
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