Author: P. V. Indiresan
Publication: The Hindu
Date: August 31, 2001
There IS much excitement about the
U.N. conference on racial discrimination. Many Dalit activists are chagrined
at the refusal of the Government of India to concede that caste discrimination
too is a form of racial discrimination. In the United States, it is accepted
that the Whites, the Blacks, the Red Indians, and the like belong to different
races. Are the Brahmins, the Vaishyas and the Sudras of different races
in the same manner?
At any rate, are the Scheduled Castes
a race apart from caste Hindus? Whether that is true or not, that the Dalits
are discriminated against is a fact. Hence, even if the Indian dirty linen
is not washed in the international forum, it must be washed clean at least
at home.
Even after 50 years of Independence
and Constitutional preferences, the Scheduled Castes trail far behind the
others in education, in income and in social status. Draconian laws notwithstanding,
untouchability is still being practised in many parts of rural India. Not
surprisingly, Dalits have become embittered, and in places have turned
violent. Hence, for the sake of social stability, every attempt should
be made to redress their genuine grievances and to bring them into the
mainstream.
The basic issue here is one of social
mobility, which can occur at three levels: the individual, the family and
the clan. The burning question in India these days is about the social
mobility of the clan rather than that of the individual or of the family.
That is why all legal and Constitutional
correctives are directed at the Scheduled Castes as a group and are not
directed at them as individuals or families. As a result, over the past
50 years, relative incomes of the Scheduled Castes have increased, and
so have their opportunities for social advancement.
However, those benefits have gone
only to a few. So, though the Scheduled Castes have enjoyed upward social
mobility at the caste level, and that upward movement has also been relatively
faster than for other castes, at the individual/family level, and in absolute
terms, that improvement has been unsatisfactory.
The Indian Constitution assumes
that the Scheduled Castes are monolithic. That was possibly true 50 years
ago but does not hold good now. Some sub-groups (sub-races?) among the
Scheduled Castes have taken better advantage of the amenities offered to
all members of the community.
If there had been enough and more
for one and all, that would not have mattered. Unfortunately, all these
privileges are concentrated at the top end of the social and economic pyramid.
With the best will in the world, there can be one and only one President
of India or Speaker of Parliament. The number of top level officials in
the Government is barely 1,000. Even at the level of clerks, the number
will be less than one per cent of the total employment in the country.
Hence, while the present system
has undoubtedly corrected some injustice at the top level, it has left
more than 99 per cent of the afflicted untouched. While economic (even
social) disparities have decreased between the Scheduled Castes and the
others, intra-Scheduled Caste disparities have increased not decreased.
That is why bitter differences have started erupting among the Scheduled
Castes themselves.
There is a lucrative international
market for those who abuse the society in which they live. Such people
get invitations for international jamborees that are not available for
more objective academics. The more abusive they are, the higher the glamour
they enjoy. Quite understandably, some Dalit activists have been exploiting
this international window of opportunity. However, there is a price to
pay: they lose the goodwill of the rest of the community.
Fifty years ago, at the time of
the framing the Constitution, there was genuine shame among the upper castes
at the way the Scheduled Castes had been treated for thousands of years.
For that reason, special privileges were enshrined for them in the Constitution.
That goodwill the Scheduled Castes commanded, that concern for their welfare,
has now eroded.
Even in the Christian community,
many are getting disillusioned about the manner in which Dalit activists
have been fighting their cause. However, these activists, instead of being
concerned at this erosion of goodwill, are revelling in the notoriety they
have acquired.
Currently, the Scheduled Castes
hold the balance of power between rival majority communities in the country,
and that gives them clout in excess of their numbers. That may or may not
last. It is a cardinal principle that a minority prospers best by commanding
the goodwill of the majority and not by exercising political clout. That
goodwill it will earn only by contributing to the society more than what
it takes out.
Dalit activists have no doubt described
in detail how bad the majority community is. By the same token, how good
are they themselves? Have they contributed more to society at large than
what they have taken out? At any rate, how much have they contributed to
the actual (e.g. educational) uplift of their own community?
It is sad to say but if must be
said that poverty is big business. There is much money to be made, much
power to be acquired by being active on poverty issues. That makes poverty
a resource; removing it a loss of capital. So, for India's politicians
(including the several hundred Scheduled Castes among them), Scheduled
Caste votes are valuable but not their welfare.
One suspects that the self-appointed
Dalit activists are in the same boat. They prosper only so long as the
people, whose cause they claim they are espousing, do not. The old order
has to change or else, as the poet feared, the world is liable to get corrupted.
For 50 years, we have practised a system of preferences that Dr. Ambedkar
wanted for 30 years and no more, which the Constitution thought would work
within 10 years.
It is now suffering from the Law
of Diminishing Returns. An aristocracy has emerged among the Scheduled
Castes and, with the existing mechanism of Scheduled Caste welfare, that
aristocracy will perpetuate itself; benefits will not percolate to those
who are still languishing. Rightly or wrongly, a feeling has developed,
even among those who are sympathetic to the Scheduled Caste cause, that
some among the Scheduled Castes are getting a double privilege - the privilege
of lower standards on top of the privilege of high social/economic status.
As a corrective, let me make a suggestion
in an area where I have some experience - admission to professional colleges.
Let the Scheduled Caste students be allowed to take their tests, say, one
week after the rest but with the same question paper. Then, they will get
to know their questions one week in advance, will get one full week to
prepare for the specific questions they have to answer. However, to get
admitted they should score as well as the others do. That will remove the
stigma they now bear that they cannot even understand the subject.
All Scheduled Castes will enjoy
social mobility when they are treated not as a caste but as people. The
problem with Dalit activists is they see the mote in the others' eye but
not in their own. Would they sacrifice the privileges they enjoy to benefit
their own people?
