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Sunday, June 5, 2011

[ZESTCaste] the original title was developed states revisited

Indian express: Plight of dalits ranjani kamala murthy

http://www.publishaletter.com/readletter.jsp?plid=28254

Dear Editor:

While the Indian economy has been growing, growth has been uneven across regions, caste, class, ethnicity etc

In India the Planning Commission for the twelfth five year plan has classified some states as backward based on economic and social indicators (http://planningcommission.nic.in/plans/planrel/12appdrft/issues_pc.pdf

In the light of huge migration of dalits, landless laborers and other poor from these backward states to to so called developed states one needs to definitely address the reasons for this migration in the long run, but IMMEDIATELY address the abysmal conditions of migrant workers in recipient 'developed' states.

To site an example a fact finding done by me at the request of Unorganized Workers Federation and Rural Development Trust in Tamil Nadu showed that migrant workers from Orissa, Andhra, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal etc were living in abysmal conditions in construction sites with same water for drinking and bathing, housing in Aluminum tins closely knit together with no privacy, no toilets, rudimentary child care provided by a NGO, education in one language provided by a NGO (under Sarva sikshya abhyan), no ration card, workers having to work 10-12 hours, receiving half a days leave per week, some not receiving payment after a month by the agent and men doing night shifts, inadequate medical services and not being allowed to go to native state immediately in case of death. Women were working upto eighth month, and when men went to work were vulnerable to sexual violence. Single women with children were also there, extremely vulnerable to exploitation. Migrants were procured through agents with some payment made to them by workers. While acts for protecting migrant workers are there, they are poorly implementedhttp://bahujannews.blogspot.com/.

It is time to give migrant workers voting rights in destination states, right to attend Gram Sabha in destination states, organise them in unions, for destination states to provide same services to migrant workers (but in their mother tongue) as to local residents irrespective of whether they collect tax/levy from employers or not, ban middlemen/women, register migrants in origin and destination states. IT SHOULD NOT BE THE ROLE OF NGOs TO PROVIDE SERVICES BUT THAT OF GOVERNMENT. Migrant workers should be covered under the proposed sexual harassment Act. All migrant workers should be registered under labour welfare board in both origin and destination states, but this is not happening. ULTIMATE EMPLOYERS- WHETHER INDUSTRIES OR SO CALLED RELIGIOUS TRUSTS (IN THIS CASE), SHOULD BE BROUGHT TO BOOK IMMEDIATELY.

Last but not the least the concept of 'Developed states' has to be revisited. Not only migrant workers' situation is dismal, but the gap between dalits and not dalits and adivasis and non adivasis is worse in Tamil Nadu and Kerala than all India which are classified as developed planningcommission.nic.in/plans/planrel/fiveyr/11th/11_v3/11v3_ch4.pdf. Kerala has seen a decline in CSR and is TN's better performance due to in-migration? The problem is displacement from rural and urban areas, lack of land rights in addition to MNREGS and the entire neo liberal paradigm.

Yes root causes of uneven development have to be addressed, but till then can the government allow migrant labour, dalits, adivasis and unorganised workers in developed states to live in near bondage? Just to (re) produce labour power for capital?

* Gratitude to migrant workers, Unorganised workers Federation, and Rural Development Trust

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Saturday, June 4, 2011

[ZESTCaste] Fwd: A legal attack on a Dalit leader, writer and a publisher of Kancha Iliaiah's Why I am not a Hindu?

This is the publisher's announcement of an important book, writing for which a court in Tamilnadu sent notices to the publisher, writer and the translator. Even those who differ with some elements of politics of Mr. Thirumavalan, the most powerful Dalit politician in Tamilnadu and the author of this book, cannot deny the force and sense in this book. The translator Meena Kandasamy is our foremost Dalit woman writer in English. Samya is the publisher of Why I am Not A Hindu by Kancha Iliaiah, a book which dramatically changed the political discourse of this country.

Now some crazy people dragged all three of them to court. It is time for us to close ranks and stand by the author, translator and the publisher. One way of showing our solidarity is to buy this book, send congratulations to the publisher and express solidarity or whatever.
This is not only an occasion for expressing and showing our solidarity but also to participate fully into a discussion on how dalit, tribal and other lower caste deities have been appropriated and brahminsed by Hindu imperialist machinery, for making which claim now some crazy idiots trying to cause problems for them.

Yours

Chittibabu Padavala

Cultural Studies/History/Sociology/Politics/Philosophy/Asian Studies

Uproot Hindutva: The Fiery Voice of the Liberation Panthers
Thirumaavalavan

Translated from the Tamil by Meena Kandasamy

We are living through times where politics masquerades in the garb of religion. Nationally and globally this seems to be true. While nationally politics has been dominated by Hindutva, globally politics has been laced in the language of jihad and crusade. So it is with pleasure that one welcomes a book that presents the absorbing and stimulating perception of an activist and a mass leader who speaks of the impact of Hindutva on our society. Thirumaavalavan, in a true style of a committed mass leader and analyst, probes the impact of this retrograde politics as it affects the lives of Dalits, women and other downtrodden sections of society. ( Foreword, Ram Puniyani)

From BJP Does Not Rule India but RSS DOES!

... If the CPI-ML has taken up a campaign against communalism in such a situation, it displays the organization's love for this land and people, for democracy and communal harmony. On a national level, the democratic forces might be few in number. But, only those few forces are today protecting democracy, and to an extent, keeping it alive.

A lot of people think that if one becomes a Member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA), they can speak about these topics in the Legislative Assembly. A few comrades here called me as an MLA. But I do not have that feeling, I do not have that idea, I do not have that belief. The Legislative Assembly is not a field for lay people. Today, this is what I say all over the state. What I said in the time when I did not enter the electoral fray, I say the same things after having entered electoral politics. The Legislative Assembly—parliamentary democracy—is useless to the lay people. It is not the field for the last man. ~ Thirumaavalavan (pp23-24)

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Friday, June 3, 2011

[ZESTCaste] School dignifies the children of squalor in Patna, eastern India

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/world/2011/0603/1224298324151.html

The Irish Times - Friday, June 3, 2011
School dignifies the children of squalor in Patna, eastern India

POVERTY IN INDIA: The tireless efforts of one man have brought hope to
some Musahar untouchables, writes RAHUL BEDI

A SLIVER of hope has emerged recently for India's "untouchable"
Musahar rat-eating community in eastern Bihar state in the form of a
modest residential school that offers their severely deprived youth
not only free and competent education but, more importantly,
long-denied self-esteem.

In two identical buildings in Bihar's capital Patna, the five-year-old
Shoshit Samadan Kendra or School for the Welfare of the Exploited
provides some 200 young Musahar boys from squalid ghettoes with board
and lodging, uniforms, toiletries, books and even access to computers
at no charge.

"I was destined to raise pigs and live a life of wretchedness and
exploitation. But that destiny changed miraculously four years ago
after joining which for me has opened up a dream world of
possibilities," said 14-year-old Pappu Kumar last week. Dressed in his
crisp, white cotton uniform and knee-length stockings, he was barely
distinguishable from students of the nearby exclusive St Xavier's, the
city's oldest, Jesuit-run school.

The academically brilliant Kumar now looks forward to the
unimaginable: competing alongside Bihar's higher castes to join one of
the handful of Indian Institutes of Technology, the world-class
campuses whose alumni manage global firms.

"[We] aim to bring about a palpable revolution in the Musahar
community which has lived in subhuman conditions for centuries," said
the school's founder JK Sinha. He retired in 2005 as one of India's
top intelligence officers and returned home to found the Shoshit Seva
Sangh or Organisation for the Welfare of the Exploited that runs the
school.

Pooling his savings with contributions from family and friends, Sinha
established Shoshit Samadan Kendra to uplift through education the
socially shunned Musahar community who ate infrequently and were
exploited as bonded labourers by upper-caste landlords and mahajans
(money-lenders).

Today, as in centuries past, the "untouchable" Musahar population of
four or five million is confined to foul-smelling ghettoes called
Mushairies or Musahar Tolis on the outskirts of many Bihar villages
without basic rights or privileges.

Being untouchables, they are considered outcasts and outside
Hinduism's rigid caste system – an ancient hereditary class order that
divides society into four categories. They are associated with
cleaning human waste, scavenging for animals and, at best, raising
pigs in soiled environments.

At the top of India's caste system are the Brahmins; at the bottom the
manual labourer Sudras; in between are the Kshatriyas or warriors and
the Vaishyas or traders below them. These antiquated gradations are
strictly enforced in Bihar, India's poorest and most regressive
province.

The high-caste Sinha, however, believes it is not enough to give
Musahar children education: they must be empowered to become a
catalyst for change within their depressed community.

According to official figures, almost all Musahars are landless
labourers and barely 3 per cent of them are literate. Social activists
in Patna estimate that, under prevailing conditions, it would take the
Musahars a mind-boggling 4,419 years to achieve complete literacy.

Decades of deprivation, apartheid and usurious money lenders has
driven many Musahars to crime. A large number of their desperate youth
have joined the proliferating Maoist movement, active across large
parts of Bihar, to secure economic and social justice for the state's
poor and dispossessed through its "people's war".

The sheer hopelessness of the Musahar community was, in small
measures, revealed over four years ago through The Irish Times .
Following a report on its foreign pages, the newspaper paid off
45-year-old Jawahar Manjhi's debt of Rs 5,000 (€77) – he had laboured
to repay this for 27 years. Manjhi's initial loan in 1980 of 40kg of
rice for a family wedding from a money-lender in Paliganj 60km from
Patna turned him, like thousands of fellow Musahars, into a bonded
labourer on his patrons' rice fields.

At the time of securing the loan, it was agreed that for each day of
work on the money-lender's farm Manjhi would be paying back the
equivalent of 1kg of rice from the 40kg he had borrowed, making a
total workload of under six weeks.

But, Manjhi ended up borrowing additional rice to feed himself and his
family and, even after 27 years, being illiterate and disadvantaged
had no idea how much of his debt remained outstanding.

He continued toiling daily in inhuman conditions and searing hot
temperatures. Occasional inquiries regarding his balance resulted
either in severe beatings or starvation – or at times both.

Eventually, in 2006, he was told that a Rs 5,000 payment would
liberate him from his bond. However, this sum remained far beyond his
reach until The Irish Times paid his debt. Bihar's exploitative
money-lenders are unusually usurious, levying crippling monthly
interest rates of 10-20 per cent or 120-240 per cent per year,
rendering debtors wholly incapable of repaying their principal sum.

This, in turn, forces them, much like Manjhi, into a lifetime of
inhuman bondage. Women too are exploited, many of them sexually, and
low-caste children, mostly Musahars, become adults in servitude.

"Musahar children know only poverty and an aimless future which, in
some small way, we aim to mitigate through the school," elaborated
Sinha, who said the initial response to his proposal for a school for
them was sceptical.

The Musahars were unconvinced that this suave former police officer –
who had lived a highly glamourous life in foreign capitals as a spy –
could offer them an alternative to the ramshackle, state-run rural
schools they knew with no teachers or textbooks and where their
persecution as "untouchables" persisted.

But within two years, their attitude changed. In 2010, some 750
Musahar children appeared for the entrance examination for 50
placements in the school.

The medium of instruction is English, the language of social mobility
and guaranteed esteem in India.

The teacher/student ratio of 1:17 is significantly better than most
leading private schools and the instructors are conscientious and well
paid.

"By ensuring the quality of education we can change, in time, the
profile of poverty in the state," Sinha said.

"I was living in filth in a mud hut with no clothes, food or dignity,"
said 11-year-old Pankaj Kumar Manjhi who previously lived on Patna's
outskirts with his widowed mother. She earned Rs 25 (40 cent) a day –
but only during the crop sowing and harvesting season lasting barely
six to eight months each year.

For the remaining period, mother and son scoured Patna's mountainous
rubbish heaps for sustenance.

"All that is behind me now," said the seventh-class student who
aspires to become an engineer, a far cry from the city's garbage dumps
and inhuman environment. "I am somebody now and will become more
important," he added confidently.

Sinha, meanwhile, who rents the school's premises and plans to
increase to 55 his annual intake of students, is determined to soon
build his own school. Land has been acquired but construction funds
are needed.

He recently launched a campaign to raise Rs 55 million (€850,000) from
local and overseas corporate groups and non-governmental
organisations. He is optimistic of achieving his goal.

"It's a meagre sum to give an entire people dignity and to trigger a
cataclysmic change amongst Musahars," he declared.

"We owe it to them."

Series concluded

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[ZESTCaste] RPI-Sena-BJP leaders vow to throw Cong-NCP out of power in state

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/nagpur/RPI-Sena-BJP-leaders-vow-to-throw-Cong-NCP-out-of-power-in-state/articleshow/8701288.cms

RPI-Sena-BJP leaders vow to throw Cong-NCP out of power in state
Ramu Bhagwat, TNN | Jun 3, 2011, 12.14am IST

NAGPUR: Leaders of the Republican Party of India (RPI), Shiv Sena and
the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) came on one platform for the first
time here and claimed that a political revolution was in the offing in
the state. "The confluence of Bhimshakti (followers of Ambedkar) and
Shiv Shakti (saffron parties) would generate enough force to throw the
Congress-Nationalist Congress out of power in the next state
elections," thundered RPI leader Ramdas Athawale.

Leaders of the three parties said they were not at all apologetic
about the disparate parties coming together. They did not mince words
to declare that the objective of this new formidable political
combination was to defeat the Congress-NCP combine in the 2014
elections. "The blue flag of Ambedkar thought will flutter along with
the saffron flag of the Sena-BJP on the Vidhan Sabha in three years,"
Athawale and the second-wrung leaders of the Shiv Sena and BJP
stressed. The packed Deshpande hall, witnessed the rare sight of RPI's
blue turbans mingling with saffron turbans as activists hailed
Babasaheb Ambedkar and Shivaji Maharaj in one voice.

"My shifting to the new combination has already disturbed the Congress
and the NCP. In desperation, my old allies have started targeting me
and also Sena supremo Bal Thackeray. NCP leader Ajit Pawar has
questioned how I was living in a four-storied house of my own in
Mumbai despite being a Dalit leader. He has questioned why Thackerays
were not into constructive projects like setting up sugar
co-operatives and mills. Returning the salvo, Athawale said had
Thackerays got into sugar mills business most of the western
Maharashtra leaders (read NCP) would have been jobless today.

"As far as my house is concerned, I have clear accounts to show that I
used my known sources of income to build it," Athawale said. However,
taking a dig at MNS chief Raj Thackeray, Athawale said Ajit Pawar
should try to find out from where Raj Thackeray got money to purchase
the Kohinoor Mills land worth hundreds of crores. RPI general
secretary Bhupesh Thoolkar accused the Congress of always working
against Babasaheb Ambedkar. It is a fact that for 27 years they did
not find him worth giving the Bharat Ratna award. It was the
non-Congress government led by VP Singh which finally bestowed that
coveted honour on Ambedkar. Only after struggling for 18 long years,
was the Marathwada University renamed after Ambedkar, he pointed out.

Besides Athawale and Thoolkar, the RPI was represented by its women's
wing chief Jyoti Lanjewar and ex-MLC Anil Gondane. The Sena had its
spokesman and MP Sanjay Raut, Vidarbha in-charge Vinayak Raut, ex-MP
Prakash Jadhav and Nagpur's deputy mayor Shekhar Sawarbandhe present
on the occasion. The BJP was represented by BJP leader in assembly
Chainsukh Sancheti, MLAs Nana Patole, Sudhakar Deshmukh,
Chandrashekhar Bawankule and mayor Archana Dehankar. Sena, BJP and RPI
workers were present in large number indicating that the new
combination was already evoking good response at the grassroot.

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[ZESTCaste] Centre to launch training programmes for SC/ST

http://www.newkerala.com/news/world/fullnews-221871.html

Centre to launch training programmes for SC/ST

Chandigarh, Jun 1: Union Ministry of Labour and Employment will start
two free employment-oriented training programmes for the unemployed
persons of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes registered in the
employment exchanges.

Stating this here today, a spokesman for Employment Department,
Haryana said that during the training programme, the candidates would
be provided scholarships besides books free of cost. The training
programmes would commence on July 1.

He said special coaching scheme for 12th pass unemployed youth of
Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes had been introduced. The
coaching scheme would last for 11 months.

During the training, the candidates would be prepared for the
competitive examinations conducted by Central government, the state
government and various banks for Group-C posts.

During the training, the candidates would be given a scholarship of Rs 5500.

--UNI