Caste no bar
ARATI R JERATH , TNN, May 29, 2010, 10.59am IST
In 2008, Nandan Nilekani, then co-chairman of Infosys, had lamented to
an audience at the Washington-based Peterson Institute of Economics ,
"There is not a single Dalit who has become an entrepreneur.'' He was
wrong, and he was right. He was wrong because two decades of economic
reforms have unleashed entrepreneurial skills across the country,
spawning businessmen and women from castes and groups that
traditionally never ventured into the risky world of finance and
enterprise. Constitutional measures for their political and social
empowerment ensured that Dalits were not insulated from the changes
taking place around them. While an Ambani or a Tata equivalent is a
distant dream, some had the audacity of hope and have managed to build
small business empires for themselves in sectors as diverse as
manufacturing, hospitality and real estate.
But Nilekani was also right. Success stories from Dalit communities
and groups are few and far between. For every Dalit who has crashed
through the barriers of social discrimination and poverty to join the
ever-growing tribe of entrepreneurs, there are lakhs who still bear
the cross of their history. According to government figures, nearly
two-thirds of the 16 per cent Dalits in the country are landless or
own such small holdings that it makes them as good as landless. They
neither have meaningful employment , nor income generating assets of
their own.
Shrinking rural space is depriving them of their traditional caste
occupations, while by the government's own admission, as stated in the
Eleventh Five Year Plan, the urban labour market offers little relief
because of the "prevalence of discrimination by caste'' .
The achievements of those who have clawed their way out of these grim
statistics are, therefore , remarkable. Few as they may be, there are
Dalit entrepreneurs who today boast of annual turnovers of over Rs 50
crore. Some are expanding rapidly and expect to generate between Rs
100-200 crore over the next couple of years, once their new projects
are up and running. Like others in business, they too own expensive
cars, party at five-star hotels and rub shoulders with a Birla or a
Munjal on occasion. If Mayawati is a symbol of Dalit political
empowerment , these entrepreneurs are aspirational figures of economic
mobility far removed from the fractious world of quotas and
reservations.
It was not easy to locate them. Given their small numbers and with no
readily available database to consult, despite a plethora of activist
organisations and a full-fledged National SC/ST Commission, finding
Dalit entrepreneurs was like looking for a needle in the proverbial
haystack. Some, like Kamalakar Mukund, proprietor of the Pune-based
Suryatech Solar System that manufactures and supplies solar water
heating system parts, have dropped their caste name to avoid
identification. Others prefer to remain invisible, like their
forefathers. The owner of a Rs 50 crore-plus food and packaged
drinking water business in Uttar Pradesh, for instance, keeps a low
profile, fearing perhaps that his products will be shunned because of
his caste, though his drinking water carries a certificate of purity
from the World Health Organisation . Scars left by centuries of social
prejudice run deep and just one generation of wealth and success
cannot erase them.
Like first generation entrepreneurs of other castes, Dalits are
dabbling in all kinds of nontraditional businesses far removed from
historical occupations like leather tanning and shoe making. Hari
Kishan Pippal may have started out life as a cobbler, but today he
also runs a swank multi-speciality hospital in Agra that employs 175
doctors. Two others, 33-year old Harsh Bhasker and 26-year old Mohan
Pradeep, have ventured to shatter another glass ceiling by moving into
education . They run coaching institutes for engineering and science
subjects in the Taj Mahal town, and Bhasker has plans to set up an
engineering college in Meerut. Perhaps because this is Mayawati
country or perhaps because they belong to a new generation of
educated, upwardly mobile Dalits, neither is apologetic about his
background. "I never thought of myself as inferior to anyone. I
compete in the open market,'' Bhasker says. Pradeep echoes his
sentiment: "I don't hide my caste. If somebody asks, I have no
hesitation in revealing my identity.''
The process may be slow and scattered, but the social and economic
profile of Dalits, particularly those in urban areas, is changing .
The 61st round of the National Sample Survey in 2004-05 found that as
many as 29 per cent of urban SC households were selfemployed . That's
not an insignificant number , points out Surinder S Jodhka, professor
of sociology in Jawaharlal Nehru University.
Sadly, no organisation in India has cared to fully map the winds of
change blowing through these communities. It is ironic that an
American university should be the first to commission a detailed
research on the growth of Dalit entrepreneurship in India. Social
psychologist and Dalit activist Chandra Bhan Prasad is carrying out
the survey
on behalf of the University of Pennsylvania's Centre for the Advanced
Study of India. He has already dug out 100-odd crorepati entrepreneurs
in the four states of Gujarat, Maharashtra, Delhi and Punjab, and is
now travelling in south India to locate others who have taken
advantage of the new economy to dump dead-end menial jobs and wipe out
the quota stigma. Says Prasad, "They are all doing well. Each one is
worth at least Rs 1 crore and some much more than that.''
Yet, these fragments of good news should not in any way introduce a
sense of complacency . Behind every successful Dalit entrepreneur is a
poignant story of hardship and struggle common to all members of
marginalised communities. Jodhka, who produced a paper on the
experiences of Dalit entrepreneurs in Panipat (Haryana), and
Saharanpur (UP), for the Indian Institute of Dalit Studies , says the
two biggest hurdles for an enterprising businessman from these groups
are the lack of financial resources and the absence of community
networks through which they can operate and grow.
"In our country, business has traditionally been controlled by certain
communities . They help each other access capital, supplies and
markets. Marginalised groups do not have this kind of support system.
They also don't have collateral, like land, that can help them raise
money to start a business,'' he says.
D Shyam Babu, who specialises in Dalit issues and is a fellow at the
Rajiv Gandhi Institute for Contemporary Studies, concurs .
"Traditional business communities not only have assets, they also
inherit entrepreneurial knowledge and culture accumulated over
generations,'' he says, adding that he firmly believes
entrepreneurship is the way forward for Dalits in a market in which
the private sector is growing rapidly while government jobs, with
their constitutionally defined quotas for SCs, expand at a much slower
rate.
It's certainly a way of moving up the socio-economic ladder. As Jodhka
pointed out, reservations have performed their role by producing a
Dalit middle class. "Now we have a large mass of people who are
agitated , restless and aspirational. They are no longer competing
within their community. They measure themselves against other caste
groups,'' he says.
Parallely, even as opportunities are opening up for them, the
experience of discrimination is probably becoming sharper as they
compete for a share of the pie. Consequently, they still need
government assistance, but of a different kind. Jodhka feels that the
government must recast its policies to address the changing
aspirations of Dalits by encouraging entrepreneurship. His
suggestions: easier access to capital through state support, a quota
for government purchases so that Dalit entrepreneurs have a ready
market and identification of sectors they can enter and flourish
without hindrance.
However, the government can help only up to a point. Shyam Babu
maintains that, ultimately, the initiative to encourage Dalits to go
into business must come from within the community itself, from the
many self-help and activists groups that have sprung up as awareness
has grown. "Once Dalits realise that they can do business , a mental
block will have been removed. Attitudinal change is very important ,''
he emphasised.
Pune-based builder Milind Kamble is perhaps the first person to take a
step in this direction. In 2005, he set up the Dalit Indian Chamber of
Commerce to provide a platform for Dalit entrepreneurs in Maharashtra
. It already boasts of 200 members and is hoping to set up associate
chapters in other states. On June 4 this year, the DICCI will hold in
Pune the first-ever expo to showcase businesses run by Dalits and
their products. "We are also arranging interactions with leading
non-Dalit businessmen and representatives from the banking sector and
the government. I hope this will help develop confidence among Dalit
businessmen ,'' Kamble says.
Babu is confident it will. "The expo will be an eye-opener . People
will see what Dalits are capable of,'' he declares.
(WITH INPUTS FROM AVIJIT GHOSH)
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