Caste Discrimination in Britain

via the Anti Caste Discrimination Alliance, UK

“The National Institute for Economic and Social Research (NIESR) were commissioned by the government in early 2010 to carry out research into caste and caste discrimination in the UK. This has been completed and their results have been published in a Report on the GEO website. This report has found that caste discrimination is occurring in the UK and as such, it support and vindicates the research that ACDA carried out in 2009, when participants in the focus groups informed ACDA of the many instances of caste discrimination they had experienced. The then government had said that the ACDA examples were anecdotal but now that their own independent commissioned research has produced its own numerous examples, this government have had to accept that Caste Discrimination is occurring in the UK.

To download a copy of the NIESR Research Report click here to open the Report directly from the Government Equalities Office website. “

 

Excerpts from the report titled Caste discrimination and harassment in Great Britain by Hilary Metcalf and Heather Rolfe

National Institute of Economic and Social Research, December 2010

…
8.4. Public behaviour

Certain public behaviour was seen as offensive and harassing or stirring up caste discrimination. They all illustrate prejudice. Some may constitute harassment, although not as covered by the Act.

A number of the qualitative interviewees mentioned problems that they had in pubs. They reported other customers speaking loudly to laud their own caste (the cases reported were Jatt) or making derogatory remarks about low castes (using the words Chamar and Chura). The immediate problems with this reported by low caste respondents were, firstly, discomfort, offence and fear and, secondly, the development of arguments and violence, with either the respondent or others participating.

X was in a group in a pub. One of the group, a Jatt Sikh, started saying ‘bad things about untouchables’. The Jatt said that he knew X was a Christian and so probably an untouchable. This shocked X. (Case study 15)

X said the only other discrimination or harassment he had experienced was in pubs, with Jatt Sikhs taunting lower caste Indians or talking loudly about Jatts and Chamars. When this happens, his friends who are also Jatt Sikhs and he leave, to avoid trouble. (Case study 20)

…
8.5  Violence and criminal activity

Some of the incidents reported in the previous chapter, notably school bullying, and the incidents in pubs reported in this chapter resulted in violence. The qualitative interviews and the literature report violence and other criminal activity resulting from alleged caste discrimination and harassment. Whilst these alleged manifestations and consequences of caste prejudice fall outside the Act, they provide important contextual information about the nature, perceptions  and consequences of alleged caste prejudice, discrimination and harassment in Britain.

One of the women who had suffered perceived caste bullying at school reported that her locality was dominated by teenage gangs. For Asians, these were caste and religion-based and excluded low caste people. This made low caste teenagers more vulnerable. ACDA (2009) also said:

• ‘You get gangs in places like Southall and you get stabbings and it’s related directly to caste.’

One person in the qualitative interviews reported a burglary allegedly due to caste:

X set up her own radio station. It was criticised for promoting the Ravidassia community. She received telephone threats from, by their accent, Indians born in the UK. The radio station was burgled. Because of the threats and because nothing other than the radio station equipment was stolen, she believes this was to stop it broadcasting, i.e. that it was caste inspired. (Case study 6)

Obviously, if the purpose of this burglary was as alleged, it is unclear whether it was caste or religion inspired.
The issue of the police taking action was raised by a number of respondents. For example, one said:

X believed that, while the majority of fights within the Asian community involve caste, when people go to the police they don’t understand it, and don’t know that ‘Chamar’ is perceived as an insult and is inflammatory. (Case study 12)

Other reports of violence were related to inter-caste marriages and relationships, resulting in the low caste man being beaten up  (Chahal, undated;  Meeting on Caste and the Equality Bill – Committee Room 4a, HOL, 4th February 2010). At the extreme, pro-caste legislation organisations claim that  the majority of so-called honour killings related to hatred caused by the caste system (discussions with pro-caste legislation organisations; Meeting on Caste and the Equality Bill – Committee Room 4a, House of Lords, 4th February 2010 Minutes).

…

Inter-caste marriages in Nepal

Excerpts from an article on the Global Press Institute website

Article found via the Inter-Caste blog intended to ‘end inter-caste and intra-caste caste apartheid in Nepal’

Inter-caste Newlyweds Face Eviction, Discrimination in Nepal

by Tara Bhattarai, Senior Reporter, Tuesday – August 17, 2010

 
KATHMANDU, NEPAL – “Love recognizes no barriers. It jumps hurdles and leaps fences,” says Sunita Sahi, 19, as she looks out the window of a bus. Her gaze falls on a young couple, kissing. “We were also in [an] affair,” she says, gesturing to her husband who sits next to her, caressing her hand. “But our families and society did not accept us.”

Sahi married Bimal Auji, 22, one year ago.

Sahi has a fair complexion, an oval face and a slim body. Her looks give away her caste. She is a member of the Thakuri caste. Sahi is from Kanchanpur in the far-western district of Nepal, nearly 400 miles from Kathmandu. Today, she and Auji live in Kathmandu. Auji is also from Kanchanpur, but he comes from a different background. To Sahi’s family, he is “untouchable.”
When news spread that a lower-caste man had proposed to an upper-caste woman, Sahi says her parents were determined to prevent the wedding.

“But our love was like an unbreakable chain,” Sahi says. “Nobody could separate us despite [the] torture,” she says as Auji shows the scars on his arms and hands — remnants of a fight where a group of villagers, including Sahi’s brothers, attacked him.

“I don’t care about the attacks by her family, I only care for her,” Auji says.

…

One year ago, Sahi and Auji left home without informing their parents. They eloped in India. Both families found out about the marriage a week later when the couple returned to Kanchanpur. Immediately, Sahi and Auji began receiving threats from Sahi’s family.

“I was physically attacked by relatives of my wife’s maternal home three times,” Auji says. “They even threatened to kill [me] if I did not leave Sahi.”

Auji says his family members are not against the marriage.

As the threats continued, the couple decided to leave their village.

“I sobbed my heart out for days when we left our village for a far-off place, leaving all our relatives,” Sahi says. “Had my family not gone against my will to marry the guy whom I loved to bits, we would have happily stayed there.”

The couple moved to Kathmandu and found themselves in a position similar to many other inter-caste couples – evicted from their homes and villages. Jagaran Media Centre, JMC, an NGO working for Dalit rights, recently released a report that revealed that dozens of couples were forced to leave their homes and villages in 2008 after marrying a member of a different caste. According to the report, there is no data available about this issue on the national scale.

…
*After the publication of this story, both Sahi and Auji got jobs and their case received national attention. A television documentary was made on their story and the prime minister’s special cell on violence against women has taken this case.

***
Read the full article here

Oral Poetry from Kalahandi 3

Edited excerpts follow from Oral Poetry of Kalahandi collected and translated by Mahendra K. Mishra & Lal Ashutosh Dash, published in 2008 by Adibasi Sanskruti Gabesana Parishad, Sinapali, Nuapada District, 766 108.

Read the first set of excerpts here and the second set of excerpts here.

From the introduction:

Kalahandi has been hit by repeated drought. Continuous occurrence of drought along with irregular rainfall has made people poorer and poorer. The daily wage labourers and landless are generally called ‘sukhbasi’ in Kalahandi, meaning those who live happily. A proverb for ‘sukhbasi’ runs thus: ‘gai noru, sukhe nid karu’ which means that men without cattle have carefree and sound sleep. About one-lakh residents of Kalahandi and Bolangir districts of Orissa (most of them Gaurs or communities belonging to the Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribe categories) have settled down in Raipur town of Chattisgarh where a slum is known as Raipur ka Narak. Thus in the native land, as also in the area of resettlement, the life of the poor people of Kalahandi is no better than a curse.

Sajani songs
These are sung by the women of western Orissa

When rainwater is not available, people think of purchasing motor pumps to irrigate the land.

Sajani, Hatikana darapana
Marudi helana thakila pena,
Motora pipe ghena.

Elephant’s ear; like mirror,
Rain failed and came the drought
Go for a motor pump.

If some government officials like Revenue Officer, Forest Officer and police come to the village, the villagers provide them with hospitality. It’s ingrained in their mind that they have power. One such event in the village is reflected in the song.

Sajani, nuabandhe jagal gada
Asila patuari hoila randha
Hatar mundi hela bandha

A heap of weeds in the new pond.
Patwari came, food was cooked
My gold ring was mortgaged.

Primary education in tribal and rural areas in Orissa is met with teacher absenteeism. This irregularity has caught the sight of the illiterate girls in the village.

Sajani, semipatar kera kera
Amara talapadre iskul dera
Dine chhada dine padha

Bunches of bean flowers.
Our Talpadar village has a school,
The teaching is done every alternate day.

The poor people of Kalahandi living below poverty line migrate from their homeland to other parts of the country. They earn their livelihood as daily wage labourers.

Sajani, Dakinela thikadara
Ghara duara chhadi bidese ghara,
Petakaje harabara

The contractors invited us,
Leaving home, we are in an alien land,
All because of the belly.

In 1985, drought occurred in Kalahandi. Rajiv Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi arrived in Boden, Sinapali, and many parts of Kalahandi. In the imagination of the people, their colour is an admixture of red and white.

Sajani, panaka betila godi,
Amar Rajib Gandhi rakata gori
Jahaje asila udi ho nuati jana
Sate Sonia ke sangedhari ho
Nuati jana

Sajani, the dove picked up the pebbles.
Our Rajib Gandhi is redwhite
He came flying in an aeroplane
With Sonia, Oh new moon listen to me.

The women folk were comfortable with coins. The paper note is difficult to get change for. So a woman says:

Sajani, Udigala udajaaja,
Tanka banigala chucha kagaja
Dukane nagala bhanja

Oh Sajani
Plane flew over the sky
Lo, the silver rupees turned into paper rupees
How difficult it is to get change for it.

The husband is not the audience of this song. This is a sort of monologue with a female friend for company. The wife dislikes the husband’s migration to distant places for money. In the folk imagination, Lanka signifies any far-off place.

Sajani,
tasni tasni tanka, Sajani,
mote charikari neijaa lanka,
kete arajiba tanka Sajani re.

Plates full of money
O sajani
Desert me not to go to Lanka
How much will you earn there?

…

From Oral Poetry of Kalahandi by Mahendra K. Mishra & Lal Ashutosh Dash

Published in 2008 by Adibasi Sanskruti Gabesana Parishad, Sinapali, Nuapada District, 766 108