Reservations XI: Is there caste-based-discrimination in India?

Whom do you ask this question?

Yesterday, some of us were having a discussion on sexual harassment and I wanted to know how it is in the Indian industry? The question that I put across was to five other engineers, all male. Nobody had a clue whether it happens or not. All we could come up with were some noted examples which everyone knew. Unanimously we agreed that being male, how would we know? We should be asking a woman if we wanted to know the real answer.

Even if we did ask them, how many Indian women would actually come out and say they have been sexually discriminated? In a society which targets women since their birth, they grow up protecting themselves from various assaults of men, and in the process learn to ignore certain subtle and small attempts and thereby accept it to various degrees.

Moreover, coming out in the open to disclose such details is a taboo in itself. There could be thousands of such cases and we would never know anything about them. (If one were to go by the number of reported cases, it is easy to conclude, by miracle, that India is sexual-harassment-free country, an unique achievement.) I think very few cases are actually reported; even those are handled in a hush-hush environment limiting to very few involved people. Only when it concerns really top officials like Phaneesh Murthy of Infosys or KPS Gill, would everyone know about it.

This brings me to the current topic- If I wanted to know whether there is a caste-based-discrimination in India, whom do I ask? Supposing all the upper caste people vouch that there is no such discrimination and that they have never resorted to such discrimination (which they do vouch for pretty strongly), should I satisfy myself and conclude that there is no caste-based-discrimination in India? It’s akin to asking only males whether there is any sexual harassment. To get the right answers to such questions, I need to ask those who are possible victims of discrimination, not the possible perpetrators. Asking educated and rich SC/ST/OBC does not give good results either. They are a minority and tend to grow up with other upper caste kids in elite schools and colleges and may never have faced outright discrimination. So, how about asking those in the rural areas where the bulk of the population resides? This poses even bigger problems because most of them do not even know what ‘discrimination’ is. They grow up accepting it as a way-of-life. That’s how they accepted it and endured it for thousands of years and they continue to do so. (The cases that are reported are usually the ones from educated SC/ST/OBC who seem to have grown out of accepting such things or the ones that have gone so brazen, like, stripping a woman naked and parading her through the streets. Million others go unreported).

In my region of Telangana, there’s a phrase Nee Baanchenu which is often used by rural or lower caste person when addressing a rich or upper caste person. Nee Baanchenu is Telangana Telugu equivalent of Nee Banisanu of Andhra Telugu, which literally translates to ‘I am your slave’. They include this in each of their sentences. Though there would be many out there who would caution me not to take such things literally, I do not think they can be brushed off so easily. To understand discrimination, one has to understand and acknowledge the importance of such literal usage and their history, because they are a consequence of something more innate to our society and has come into existence reflecting the ground realities of our times. We need to understand why and how terms like Nigger have become a denigrating aspersion in US or how Chamar has now become an insult in Northern India. These words and phrases give clear indications of attitudes of that society.

Most of the rural low caste people accept all kinds of discrimination explaining it away as their fate. When people do not know what is discrimination, and have no clue what is self-respect, a question posed to them is of no use. It does not produce any results. Then how do you know if such a caste-based-discrimination exists?

One could spend time with them in rural India and get to know their daily life and report it. That alone will have thousands of instances of discrimination. One could go to various government offices and institutions of India where they have SC/ST/OBC employees and ask them various questions (and please don’t give this task to CNN-IBN. They can frame the question such a way that the result of the poll, based on SMS, would actually conclude that it is upper caste who is discriminated). One could ask rich and middle class SC/ST/OBC or those who have recently come to good positions. When prodded they may tell you few stories of discrimination, meted out to their relatives in villages or their forefathers. Or go to small town universities and check how rampant casteism is. They are all educated people with PhDs but their vocabulary consists of many expletives and insults based on caste. The caste-based discrimination is a part of their everyday decision process.

If the media was little more inclusive and was comfortable airing the views of some of these lower caste people, they will hear more such stories. I have one sample here. It is from NDTV, reported by Harsha Kumari Singh, dated Thursday, June 1, 2006 (from Amarpura Village).

Dalits continue facing social bias

“…In a break from tradition Bansi Lal Meghwal, a Dalit bridegroom in Amarpura village dared to ride a horse to his wedding but was forced to dismount. But what the Dalits hoped would be a step towards social equality turned out to be an incident that exposed how deep caste prejudices run in society. His wedding procession was pelted with stones and the guests attacked by the upper caste in the village… Their water supply has been stopped and the village shops refuse to sell them rations…”

Siddharth Varadarajan writes (in THE HINDU, June 3, 2006, titled ‘Caste matters in the Indian media’):

“In 1999… from University College of Medical Sciences (UCMS)… the Scheduled Caste students were confined to two floors and not assigned rooms elsewhere…In the dining hall, they were forced by the forward caste majority to sit together at one end… would be abused ‘Bloody shaddu’…”

I could go on adding many such examples but I don’t think it will serve the purpose. Those who want to deny discrimination will continue to do so in spite of the overwhelming evidence; or they come up with excuses to explain it away (saying that it was just division of labor and nothing to do discrimination). Watching Nuremberg trials (post-WWII), one can judge the extent of this human stubbornness. The Nazi war criminals refused to believe that any of the crimes against Jews, Poles, gays, gypsies, Russians, ever took place. In spite of huge pile of evidence that was brought before them through audio, video and witness accounts, they maintained that it was all a conspiracy; and even if some of them did concede, they refused to believe that it was done at such massive scale.

This blog is only directed to those genuine upper caste Hindus who seriously ask themselves- ‘Does caste-based-discrimination exist in India?’ They might be reasoning to themselves- ‘I never discriminate. Neither any of my friends who are SC/ST/OBC seem to have experienced this’ and quickly conclude that no such discrimination exists.

What I want to say to them is this: Stop asking those people who have not experienced it. The India that you know is different from the rest of India (which is more than 75% of India). Even if you did visit a village, you went there as a tourist. It’s like a European who comes to India for a short trip and finds everything amusing and quirky but never understands the deep undercurrents. Just because you did not know it existed till yesterday doesn’t make it unreal or a figment of imagination of some writers and some speakers. It is not something the politicians have conjured up out of an empty hat. It is not something the media and the politicians have thrust on you all of a sudden. It is just that you are waking up to the real India which you never knew existed. It’s something similar to many ordinary Germans waking up to the horrors of Holocaust after the end of the war. They couldn’t believe that such things ever happened in their midst and were in denial for a long time. [I can easily foresee some ‘smart’ comments which forbid me from comparing our discrimination to heinous crimes of Holocaust]

Why do I think diversity is important to all of us even if it means paying a small price?

I get these nasty jokes in my e-mail inbox ridiculing SC/ST/OBC reservations. When I look at the chain of addresses to see where it has been circulated before, I realize that they have been through companies like Infosys, Wipro and other top IT companies. The senders assume that all their co-workers are upper caste. This assumption is either out sheer arrogance or sheer ignorance, and in this case both are dangerous.

Being oblivious to sensitivities of other communities and their travails is as bad as committing discrimination itself. Why do I think so? Because by being ignorant of the sensitivities we continue to perpetuate certain notions that indirectly condones caste-based-discrimination. Continued ignorance and apathy desensitizes us and we tend to devolve ourselves of our basic duties when it is warranted. This desensitization is one of the main reasons why so many ordinary Germans tolerated and allowed oppression, subjugation and extermination of so many Jews during 1933-45.

Would that guy who sent that e-mail at that top IT company would have been so callous (or careless) if he knew that there were at least 30% lower caste employees in his campus? I believe he would have been more cautious (I am hoping that he sent it out of ignorance rather than arrogance). Would media (like CNN-IBN) be reporting highly biased reports supporting anti-reservations protests completely sidelining and deliberately ignoring pro-reservation protests if they knew that their own staff had at least 30% of SC/ST/OBC?

Siddharth Varadarajan continues:

“The insensitive and casteist forms of protest some of them adopted – the ‘symbolic’ sweeping of the streets, the shining of shoes, the singing of songs warning OBCs and others to ‘remember their place’ (‘apni aukat mein rahio’) – were put on air without comment by the channels.”

“When B.N. Uniyal surveyed the scene in 1996, he found not a single Dalit accredited journalist in Delhi… an informal survey had found that the number of accredited North Indian OBC journalists in Delhi was under 10…”

He adds:

“… journalism that has little or no space for the majority of citizens is bound to end up missing out on the complexity of the society it seeks to cover…”

Diversity, by including SC/ST/OBC/Muslim in the media, would bring in certain degree of tolerance towards ‘other kind’ of people and teach them to respect the sensitivities of these groups. Next time, when they want to air a completely biased report, they may be a bit cautious and make sure they are covering all sides. Diversity, by promoting a good % of SC/ST/OBC in IT companies, would make that guy who sent out that mail think whether it was the right thing to do. That little caution is worth paying a small price.

Update:

CNN-IBN : Indian media caught in a caste warp.