DALITS/SCHEDULED CASTES - 2013 - Indian Social Institute

New Delhi: With more than 626 million people daily defecating in the open, India is on the verge ofbecoming the "global capital of open defecation", an NGO said here Monday. More than 55 percentwomen from the Dalit community daily face harassment at the hands of rowdy males when they go out inthe open to defecate, said Rajesh Upadhya, executive director of the National Confederation for the Dalit."The situation won't improve till the Indian government stops making false promises and immediatelyimplements the policies meant for providing proper sanitation facilities to the Dalit community," he toldmedia persons. Upadhya was speaking on the right to sanitation and hygiene for Dalits. He said that evendecades after independence, sanitation-related problems with Dalits have increased all over the country."The condition is so bad that there are only 30-40 toilets for 29,000-30,000 people in every Dalit colony inthe capital," he said. "Only 17-18 percent of the people from the Dalit community are able to avail propersanitation facilities," Upadhya said. "The budget allocated for sanitation is not being fully utilised and if thecommunity asks for toilets, the bureaucrats do nothing about it," Upadhya told IANS. "There is notransparency in the usage of funds allotted by the government," he said. (Deccan Herald 19/11/13)Status quo for Dalits: caste shame for royal state of Rajasthan (2)Jaipur: Dalit activist Bhanwar Meghvanshi quips, “The running battle is on even three decades afterPahadia as CM faced untouchability. Quite often Dalit legislators are compelled to remain subservient toupper-caste leaders who get them the ticket or spend money on their elections.” He quotes a glaring caseof a scheduled caste seat in Bhilwara where for 20 years a Rajput leader controlled the politics of thearea so much so that the MLA himself lived in the servant’s quarters for 10 years while the leaderoccupied the bungalow allotted to him. The officers are also known by their caste labels and not thepositions they hold. Advocate Satish Kumar says, “Even today caste reaches the village before theposition – ‘he may be a Meghawal but is a good officer’.” Every caste has its own gods and temples andDalits are kept out of them. Thus while officers use the Dalit leaders to mobilise lucrative postings, theyfail to deliver or face political pressure in initiating action under the SC/ST Act. Nothing has changed inroyalty-dominated Rajasthan in the past three decades where the Dalits’ fight for ownership of five bighasof land, where their dream of empowerment is buried, continues unabated. The neighbouring state ofUttar Pradesh showed them the way where ownership of allotted land gave them the elusive dignity. Buthere they have yet to find a Mayawati of Rajasthan. The Dalit leader, whose catchphrase of dignitycatapulted her to national political heights, has not become a household name in the desert state thoughher mentor, Kanshi Ram, had built the party’s base of a bureaucratic network. Ostensibly, there are tworeasons – the Jatavs are not a dominant caste and the 17% Dalit population is not only scattered in thestate but are also divided into 62 sub-castes. Meghvanshi says: “The political parties also prefer puppetsor docile Dalit leaders of a sub-caste who are small in numbers in a constituency. For example, theBairawas are a dominant caste but the ticket will go to the Mochi caste, which has barely 300 votes in theShahpura constituency.” The chairperson of the Centre for Dalit Rights, PL Mimroth, laments, “The fightfor land rights is interlinked with social and political empowerment as five bigha zameen gives themdignity as well as economic independence. But we will have to wait for another 50 years to achieve it.”According to him, the Bhoodan movement could not be implemented in letter and spirit because of thefeudal social structure, both in political and social set-ups. “At least 50% of the land allocated to Dalits iseither encroached or has gone back to the powerful landowners,” he says. Thus, the Dalits are fighting atwo-pronged battle – for economic independence and political participation. (Hindustan Times 20/11/13)Status quo for Dalits: caste shame for royal state of Rajasthan (2)Jaipur: Dalit activist Bhanwar Meghvanshi quips, “The running battle is on even three decades afterPahadia as CM faced untouchability. Quite often Dalit legislators are compelled to remain subservient toupper-caste leaders who get them the ticket or spend money on their elections.” He quotes a glaring caseof a scheduled caste seat in Bhilwara where for 20 years a Rajput leader controlled the politics of thearea so much so that the MLA himself lived in the servant’s quarters for 10 years while the leader