Tuesday, March 30, 2010

[ZESTCaste] Varun Gandhi slams Mayawati in speech

 

Varun Gandhi slams Mayawati in speech

March 29, 2010 20:30 IST
Playing to the Hindutva gallery, newly-appointed Bharatiya Janata
Party [ Images ] secretary Varun Gandhi [ Images ] demanded a ban on
cow slaughter and vowed to give UP Chief Minister Mayawati [ Images ],
who had jailed him for his hate speeches against Muslims, the same
treatment meted out to him.
"If somebody attacks my mother, would I not stand in front of her to
protect her? Cow-slaughter is not only a social crime it is also a
criminal act but not a single case has been filed," Varun said at a
rally."Why are we silent on this issue?" he added, while urging the
crowd to put their hands up in support of the cause. Spewing venom
against Mayawati, the Pilibhit [ Images ] MP said her government had
money only for garlands and installing statues and not for the poor.

"Malawatiji....It is very difficult to understand whether it is
Malawati or Mayawati," Varun said ridiculing the BSP leader over the
money garland issue. "She gave me so much respect during the
elections. When our time comes we will give her even more respect,"
the 30-year-old BJP leader said.

Varun has had a running feud with the BSP supreme since she slapped
the stringent National Security Act against him for making hate
speeches during the last Lok Sabha elections and jailed him. However,
it was later revoked.Referring to the stampede in Kripalu Maharaj's
ashram in Pratapgarh in which 65 people were killed, he said, "there
is money for Rs 5-Crore, Rs 10-Crore garlands but when it comes to
giving compensation the government says it has no money. It has done
'murtikaran' (filled the city with Mayawati's statues) of Lucknow [
Images ]."

Raising the issue of the Bareilly riots, Varun wondered if the
violence was a "well-thought out game-plan" of the Mayawati regime.

He also criticised the Uttar Pradesh [ Images ] administration for
arresting his mother and Aonla MP Maneka Gandhi when she tried to meet
the riot-affected in the district."I am totally against communalism.
But why were they (Muslims) given permission to take out a procession
on Holi when it is well-known how people celebrate this festival with
such fervour," Varun said.

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[ZESTCaste] Koneru, a messiah of Dalits: Rosaiah

 

http://www.siasat.com/english/news/koneru-messiah-dalits-rosaiah

Koneru, a messiah of Dalits: Rosaiah
Monday, 29 March 2010

Gudavalli, March 29: Chief Minister K Rosaiah described former deputy
chief minister Koneru Ranga Rao as Messiah of Dalits saying that the
latter had done great service to the community.

Garlanding the portrait of the late Minister Koneru Ranga Rao, the
Chief Minister conveyed his deep condolences to Rao's family. ``It's a
big loss to the State, Congress party and to me personally,'' he
added.

Recalling his association with the departed leader, the Chief Minister
said that they had together served as Ministers under three chief
ministers--Chenna Reddy, Vijaya Bhaskar Reddy and Janardhan Reddy.
``He used to be very affectionate towards me and it was great
experience working with him,'' he said.

Appreciating his services for the Congress and State Government,
Rosaiah said that Koneru had his page reserved in the history of the
Congress as he had done great deal of work during his stint as a
Minster.

``He was also very much affectionate towards his village, its people
as he used to visit the village frequently,'' Rosaiah observed.

All the public representatives who participated in the condolence
meeting of Koneru Ranga Rao urged Chief Minster K Rosaiah to implement
the recommendations of Koneru Ranga Rao committee on land distribution
to the poor.

They opined that it was the only a way to pay fitting tribute to the
great leader.

They observed that the committee's recommendations were in favour of
poor and downtrodden in the State and the Government should give
utmost priority to implementation of the recommendations.

Taking their views into consideration, the chief minister promised
that he would discuss the matter with officials concerned and public
representatives over the feasibility of implementing the
recommendations.

Responding to the pleas of party leaders to construct a memorial to
the departed leader in Vijayawaada, Rosaiah said that he would discuss
the matter with the district public representatives and take steps in
this regard.

Union Minister of State for Railways, K H Muniyappa expressed his deep
condolence to the Rao's family.

Former Chief Minister Nedurumalli Janardhan Reddy, Ministers--P
Ramachandra Reddy, Kolusu Parthasarathy, Legislative Council deputy
chairman Mohammad Jani, MPs--VH Hanumantha Rao, Lagadapati Rajagopal,
Manda Jagannadham and YS Jaganmohan Reddy, former ministers--
Pinnamaneni Venkateshwar Rao and Devineni Rajashekar, MLAs--Malladi
Vishnu, Jogi Ramesh Madiga and Ambati Rambabu, MRPS founder president
Manda Krishna Madiga, CPM leader Nomula Narsimhaiah, MLCs--P Sudhakar
Reddy, Ilapuram Venkaiah, Nanapaneni Rajakumari and Jeelli Wilson, TRS
leader and former MLA of Vikarabad A Chandrashekar were among those
who expressed their condolences to Rao's family.

--Agencies

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[ZESTCaste] 20 injured in clash between 2 groups

 

http://www.newkerala.com/news/fullnews-80230.html

20 injured in clash between 2 groups

Madurai, Mar 30 : At least 20 people were injured in a clash between
caste Hindus and Dalits during a local temple festival at Palamedu,
here early today.

Police sources said the trouble started after a Dalit youth in an
inebriated condition indulged in a wordy quarrel with caste Hindus
during an Idol procession in connection with Sri Mariyamman Temple
festival.

The wordy duel later turned into a scuffle between the people of two
communities. Several tube lights and speaker boxes were ransacked in
the clash, as both sides pelted stones on each other and attacked with
wooden logs.

Senior police officials rushed to the village with additional police
force and restored normalcy.

Police filed cases under sections 147, 148, 324, 336, 427 and 310 (10)
of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) against both sides and were
investigating.

--UNI

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[ZESTCaste] Dalit woman, children commit suicide

 

http://www.ptinews.com/news/588081_Dalit-woman--children-commit-suicide

Dalit woman, children commit suicide

STAFF WRITER 17:7 HRS IST
Jaunpur (UP), Mar 30 (PTI) A dalit woman allegedly committed suicide
along with her two children by jumping into a well in Bargaon village
in the district today.

Police said the woman who jumped into the well was unhappy as her
husband had been turning down her demand for money for buying new
clothes for the children for the past several months.

The bodies have been taken out and sent for post mortem, sources said.

According to sources, the husband of the deceased was a labourer under
the NREGS but was lately out of work.

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Press Note: Muslim Dalit Reservation Movement

Link:
http://www.pasmandamuslims.com/2010/03/press-note-muslim-dalit-reservation.html

Press Note

'Muslim Dalit Reservation Movement' floated to intensify and coordinate efforts for abolishing religious discrimination against Muslim Dalits

In a meeting held under chairmanship of Shri Anis Ansari, IAS (formerly APC) on 24th March, 2010 at Sana Palace, Shahnajaf Road, Lucknow, a group of intellectuals and well wishers of Muslim Dalits decided to setup a body called Muslim Dalit Reservation Movement. The participants showed their deep concern on the fact that since Independence Muslim community in India has been declining in all spheres of public life. They realized that the root cause of decline of Indian Muslims has been their low representation in institutions and organs of governance such as Parliament, Assemblies, Zila Panchayats and Boards of Banks etc. in proportion to their population. It was decided that concerted and focused efforts must be made to ensure adequate representation of Muslims in all government institutions specially Parliament, Assemblies, Panchayats etc.

Though various movements under different nomenclatures were started, and are still continuing for redressing the grievances of the community, these could be more fruitful if better coordination is achieved among them. Therefore, it was decided that a fresh, forceful and concerted endeavour must be launched with the cooperation of all like-minded people, so that the scattered groups may be brought on one platform in order to intensify the struggle in this direction.

To carry out the mission of the Movement (MDRM), a coordination committee comprising Mr. Anis Ansari, I.A.S., formerly A.P.C. –Convener, Mr. Zafaryab Jilani, Mr. Khan Mohd. Atif, Mr. Javed Khan, Mr.Rais Ansari, Dr. M.K. Sherwani, Mr. Salahuddin Sheebu, Dr. M.A. Siddiqi, Mr. Abdul Naseer Nasir and Mr. Abdul Najeeb and Mr. Seraj Ansari was constituted.

In order to facilitate enhancement of Muslim representation in Parliament and Assemblies and gain economic advantages for Muslims, it is essential that discrimination against Muslim Dalits on the basis of their religion, perpetrated by clause 3 of Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Order 1950 is abolished. This clause, as amended in 1956 and 1990, provides that no person who possesses a religion different from the Hindu, Sikh or Buddhist religion shall be deemed to be a member of Scheduled Caste. Thus this clause closes the doors of reservation provided by the Constitution under Article 341 to Muslim (and Christian) Dalits, even though they carry on the same traditional occupations as are carried out by their Hindu, Sikh or Buddhist counter-parts and suffer from similar social and educational backwardness. There is a clear case to remove this religious discrimination against Muslim and Christian Dalits as this clause has been found to be unconstitutional and unfair by Ranganath Mishra Commission. Our plea is that, as recommended by Ranganath Mishra Commission, all the Muslim and Christian communities who have been carrying on same family occupations traditionally as those carried on by Hindu, Sikh or Buddhist scheduled castes and suffer from similar social and educational backwardness must be treated at par with their Hindu counter-parts. This clause can be deleted by a simple majority of Parliament without any constitution amendment.

Many Muslim communities have been recognized by Union / State Governments as Other Backward Classes (OBC). They are eligible to be benefited by 27% reservation given by Government of India as also State Governments in matter of public employment. However due to prevailing caste system and influence of money etc. Muslim OBCs have not been able to get due share in Government jobs. Therefore it is desirable that OBCs are divided into two categories: Backwards and Most Backwards. As in Bihar, Muslim OBCs should be placed in the category of Most Backward Classes. This is likely to result in enhanced share to Muslim OBCs in government jobs.

Under the present constitutional provisions, reservation cannot and should not be granted on the basis of religion to Muslims or any other community. Only such classes of Muslims who are socially and educationally backward should be brought within reservation coverage. This approach, besides being in consonance with the judicial interpretations, is also a non-communal approach to reduce the handicaps of socially and educationally backward sections of Muslims. This approach would also be more easily acceptable to large segments of Hindus and other communities which will facilitate achieving the objective.

Government of India has been mandating earmarking of about 23% funds of Plan budget for the benefit of SC/STs every year throughout the country which have been used for providing roads, schools, hospitals, drinking water, electricity, drainage, scholarships and such other civic facilities. Similarly, 27% of Plan budget should be earmarked by GOI for the benefit of OBCs including Muslim OBCs.

The meeting raised its serious objections against the Women Reservation Bill in its present form, and demanded a separate quota for Scheduled Castes/Tribes and OBCs (including Muslim OBCs). If women in general need to be extended 33% reservation in Parliament and Assemblies because there is gender bias against them, there is sharper gender bias coupled with castes bias against SC/ST, OBC and Muslim women. Therefore a sub-quota of 23% for SC/STs and 27% for OBCs (including Muslim OBCs) must be extended to under-privileged women. Giving bland reservation to women may result into political fraud against SC/ST and OBC (including Muslim OBCs) who are already under-represented in Parliament and Legislative Assemblies.

The meeting authorized the Coordination Committee to work out the strategy through various democratic means to educate masses about the comprehensive benefits from the fulfilment of these demands, and will send a clear message to all the political parties that they will get the electoral support of the people only if they make a solemn commitment in this regard publicly and work to secure these objectives.

The coordination committee has been empowered to seek the support from all fair minded individuals and bodies whose credentials as the sympathizers of justice and fair play for all classes of citizens are well-established and who aspire to build India on the pillars of equality and fraternity.

Anis Ansari, IAS (R)
Convener,
Muslim Dalit Reservation Movement (MDRM)
Date: 29, March, 2010



Thanks & Regards,
Indian Dalit Muslims Voice
www.dalitmuslims.com

[ZESTCaste] Fwd: Invitation - Vidrohi Phule

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Shirish Ramteke <shirish_ramteke@yahoo.com>
Date: Thu, Mar 25, 2010 at 3:49 PM
Subject: Invitation - Vidrohi Phule

Dear All,

Jai Bhim!


VIDROHI PHULE


   The Collection of Poems of Vipin, the 20 years old son of Shyam
Tagade, IAS is to be released at the hands of
Hon. Ratnakar Gaikwad, IAS,
(Metropolitan Commissioner, MMRDA.)

Date: 27th March 2010

Time: 4.00 p.m.

Venue: Scout & Guide Pavilion, Shivaji Park,
            Dadar West, Mumbai

In the presence of ....

Hon. B I Nagrale
IAS (Commissioner Maharashtra Scout and Guides)

Hon. Shyam Tagade
IAS (Managing Director, Filmcity, Mumbai)

Hari Narke (Advisor, Planning commission, Govt. of India and Member
Secretary Mahatma Phule writing and speeches publication committee)

Kamal Wankhede
(Dy. Director Sayhadri Channel, Doordarshan Kendra, Mumbai)

Meghana Vipradas
(Hon. Administrator, Jai Vakil School, Sewri, Mumbai.)

Manohar Ranpise
(Journalist)

 & Others.....

Kavita Sangraha consists of poems on dhamma, Social revolutionaries,
present socio-political issues & other topics.

The poems are a part of Babasaheb Ambedkar's mission.

You are requested to grace the function to encourage the child & to be
a part of mission.

The Book has been designed and printed by the team of Vishwa Leader.

Thanks and Regards
Shirish Ramteke

For details contact:
Surekha Ramteke
Vishwa Leader (Marathi Monthly Magazine)
Unit No.1, Malwa,
Patanwala Industrial Estate,
L. B. S. Marg,
Ghatkopar (West),
Mumbai – 400086.
Tel. No.: 022 25006697
Tel./Fax:022 25006696
Email:Vishwa. leader@gmail. com
Help Desk: 9969688918


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[ZESTCaste] Mishra’s wings clipped, no longer BSP’s No. 2

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/Mishra-s-wings-clipped--no-longer-BSP-s-No--2/597404

Mishra's wings clipped, no longer BSP's No. 2

Sanjay Singh Posted online: Tuesday , Mar 30, 2010 at 0119 hrs
Lucknow : Amidst the controversy over Mayawati's currency garland, an
important development in the BSP has passed almost unnoticed. Party
general secretary Satish Chandra Mishra, who was considered architect
of the BSP's Dalit-Brahmin social engineering that catapulted the
party into power in UP, has been asked to stay away from political
matters. Instead, Mishra has been made head of the party's newly
formed legal cell and asked to concentrate on legal matters of the
party and the government.
Mayawati herself announced Mishra's new role at the March 15 rally.
Mishra would not involve himself in political programmes, she said.
Lest there should be any confusion, she also announced that Energy
Minister Ramvir Upadhyaya would work on associating Brahmins with the
party while MP Dhananjay Singh would woo the Kshatriyas.

Mishra had emerged as the second most powerful man in the BSP after
the formation of the BSP government in May 2007. He enjoyed tremendous
clout as party general secretary. Mayawati created a State Advisory
Council (SAC), giving it the task of reviewing the work of government
departments and formulating plans and policies, and made Mishra its
chairman. In this capacity, Mishra regularly summoned ministers and
officers for meetings. Naturally, he came to be regarded as the
'number two' in the party.

Party leaders say that by clipping Mishra's wings, Mayawati has tried
to reassure the Dalits, her party's core constituency, that there is
no number two in the BSP, and that she is the only leader. In the
past, she has stated that after her death too, the BSP will be headed
by a Dalit. She used the rally to reassure the Dalits that the BSP is
their party. In fact, she told the gathering, "Main Dalit samaj ka sir
neecha nahin hone doongi kisi keemat par."

Mayawati never felt the need to reassure the Dalits until the BSP's
poor show in the Lok Sabha polls last year. While she dreamt of
becoming the PM, the BSP got only 20 seats, behind the Congress's 21
and the SP's 22. Clearly, the 'sarvjan formula' had failed to click.
Worse, the Congress revival threatened to erode the BSP's Dalit vote
bank. Traditionally, the Dalits had been Congress supporters and under
Rahul Gandhi the Congress was making efforts to reach out to them.
Rahul himself was making much-publicised visits to Dalit houses.

Further, the feedback that Mayawati got from BSP workers suggested
that sections of Dalits were getting disillusioned. Not only was the
government not doing anything for them, the character of the party was
changing with people from other communities holding dominant
positions. It was then that Mayawati realised that she needed to
reassure the Dalits. This was when the erosion of Mishra's authority
began.

In a party meeting held to review the election results, Mayawati
announced that Mishra would devote himself mainly to fighting legal
battles of the party and the government while she herself would take
care of associating non-Dalits with the party. Quietly, the SAC was
made defunct — it has not held a single meeting after the Lok Sabha
debacle. With her announcement on March 15, Mayawati completed the
process of cutting Mishra to size.

Simultaneously, Mayawati took several administrative steps, which
included reservation for Dalits in government contracts, a programme
to increase Dalit participation in co-operatives, ensuring that the DM
and the SSP — at one stage even the DGP — visited the spot whenever
there was a crime against Dalits, and installation of solar lamps in
Ambedkar villages.

Mayawati started giving important positions to Dalits in the
administration. Last month, she appointed Net Ram, a Dalit officer, as
the Additional Cabinet Secretary in her CMO and ordered that all files
be routed through him. Until then, files were routed through V S
Pandey, also an Additional Cabinet Secretary. She appointed former
Lucknow DM Chandra Bhanu as secretary in the CMO, taking the number of
Dalit officers to four, the other two being Vijai Singh and Anil Sant,
both secretaries. Pandey, who was Principal Secretary of Information
and Public Relations, was later removed, reportedly for his handling
of the controversy over the currency garland.


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[ZESTCaste] A blue garland for the elephant

 

http://www.hardnewsmedia.com/2010/03/3506

A blue garland for the elephant

Anticipating Dalit support for Rahul Gandhi and Congress in the next
assembly polls, Mayawati is returning to her pro-Dalit agenda with a
vengeance
Pradeep Kapoor Lucknow

Reeling under constant fear of the Congress weaning away Dalit voters
from the party, UP Chief Minister Mayawati organised a 'maharally' in
commemoration of 25 years of the party and birth anniversary of its
founding-member, Kanshi Ram, in Lucknow on March 15. She addressed her
core voters for about two hours.

Opposition leaders have bitterly criticised her for pumping in huge
amounts of money, the entire UP power apparatus and official machinery
for organising the show though ordinary people continued to suffer due
to the recent communal riots and subsequent curfew in Bareilly, and
relentless inflation.

The situation got aggravated with reports of fresh rounds of violence
after Taukir Raza Khan, who belongs to the influential family of the
founder of Bareilvi Muslims, was arrested by the UP regime. He was
released later, but the tension due to his arrest remained simmering.
Communal violence in Bareilly was sparked earlier on March 2.

Local Congress MP, Praveen Singh Aron, said the arrest and subsequent
release of Khan was part of a wider BSP conspiracy. When released,
Khan claimed that he was arrested because he had backed Congress in
the last Lok Sabha polls.

Political commentators see the Bareilly riots as an attempt to
polarise the politics of the city where the sitting MP is from
Congress, after BJP had called the shots for 22 long years. While the
upper castes have voted for BJP in the past, there has been tough
competition between BSP, Congress and Samajwadi Party (SP) to win over
Muslims voters.

Muslims are upset with the BSP government for handling the riots with
characteristic non-seriousness, and for prolonging the curfew,
derailing lives of ordinary people including of students appearing for
their board examinations. Others sense a conspiracy behind the
violence in what is basically a deeply secular social fabric.
Observers say that these riots would be a major setback for Mayawati
who is trying to gain Muslim support to retain power in the next
assembly polls.

She is aware that Muslims have deserted SP after Mulayam Singh joined
hands with Kalyan Singh, as is evident from SP's loss of seats in the
last Lok Sabha elections with not one winning Muslim candidate. She
knows that a large chunk of Muslim votes went to Congress that won 22
out of 80 seats in UP. The party seems to have gained sympathy from
alienated Muslims after AICC general secretary and in-charge of UP
affairs, Digvijay Singh, visited Azamgarh and took an 'open stand' on
the Batla house encounter, widely perceived to be fake. He clearly
said, "I have seen the photographs of the youth killed in the
encounter. I think there should be a probe."

Obviously, he was referring to the killing of young Sajid, 18, with
five bullet wounds on the upper side of his head. Indeed, the latest
post mortem reports refute the police version, including the reference
of Sajid being hit by a "blunt force". Rahul Gandhi is also expected
to do his bit in his scheduled visit to Azamgarh. In that sense,
Azamgarh, branded as a 'terrorist haven' by an irresponsible media,
represents the collective angst and anger of the Muslim community in
UP.

In these circumstances, Mayawati has given more importance to her
trusted lieutenant, Nasimuddin Siddiqui, who holds important
ministries and is virtually the number two cabinet minister. Siddiqui
is the Muslim face responsible for winning over minority votes. After
the Lucknow rally, Mayawati gave additional charge of the agriculture
ministry to Siddiqui to emphasise his growing importance. Siddiqui was
seen handling the dais and raising slogans for 'behenji'.

There has been a raging controversy over the huge cash garlands used
to decorate Mayawati. Mulayam Singh and Digvijay Singh claimed the
notes to be in the denomination of Rs 1,000 each, between Rs 2 to 6
crore, with the latter calling her daulat ke beti instead of Dalit ki
beti (wealth's daughter, instead of Dalit's daughter). UPCC president
Rita Bahuguna called the BSP rally "a circus, with Mayawati as the
ring master."

Despite adverse reactions from multiple quarters, BSP workers yet
again presented Mayawati with another currency-note garland on March
16. They maintain that the two garlands cost them 'only' Rs 22 lakh
and 18 lakh, and were brought with money collected by party workers.
Siddiqui has announced that if allowed, the party will keep garlanding
her with money garlands in the future. The income tax department has
started investigating the case, but, surely, nothing is going to come
out of it.

Analysts argue that BSP has tried to send a message across to party
workers that they are loaded with funds. Dalit experts feel that
though the city's elite may feel bad about the wastage of money on
garlands, her workers are happy that their party is rich and
flourishing.

Lucknow was turned blue with the BSP colour and its symbol - the blue
elephant. A film showcasing how Kanshi Ram and Mayawati are harbingers
of change was screened. Painted blue, the city's crossings shone with
blue lighting for days together, with giant hoardings of Dalit icons,
and decorated memorials and statues at every corner. The opposition
alleged that the entire government machinery was sucked into this
show. There is perceptible anxiety about the total budget of the rally
which could range between Rs 200-500 crore!

Mayawati's rhetoric confirmed that her priority was consolidation of
Dalit voters for the next assembly polls. She asked her supporters to
prepare to capture power at the Centre as well. Brazenly justifying
the money spent on her statues and memorials, she said it was only one
per cent of the budget while targeting Congress for over-spending on
building memorials for Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv
Gandhi. She branded the 'Dalit-love' of Rahul Gandhi as a 'tamasha'
(spectacle), blaming Congress for conspiring to ruin her by filing the
Taj heritage corridor and disproportionate assets cases against her.

To appease those voters who fear a Brahmin takeover of the BSP, she
has apparently 'demoted' her lieutenant Satish Mishra from the number
two slot to the legal cell to fight multiple cases filed against her.
A tedious and difficult job, indeed. Not just Mishra, officers close
to him have been sidelined. Mayawati has been avoiding public
appearances with him while giving important positions to Dalits in the
state's bureaucratic set-up.

With her gaze fixed on the 2012 assembly polls, behenji is building on
the fact that both SP and BJP are weak political contenders. That
explains her tirade against the Congress all through the rally.

APRIL 2010

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[ZESTCaste] BSP concedes ground for Rahul-led Ambedkar rally

http://beta.thehindu.com/news/states/other-states/article321306.ece


Published: March 29, 2010 20:02 IST | Updated: March 29, 2010 21:44
IST LUCKNOW, March 29, 2010

BSP concedes ground for Rahul-led Ambedkar rally
Special Correspondent

With the ruling Bahujan Samaj Party and the Congress now involved in a
tussle over sharing the legacy of Baba Saheb Bhimrao Ambedkar,
Mayawati Government on Monday granted permission to the Congress for
staging a rally in Ambedkar Nagar on April 14, at a venue opted by the
Congress, after the issue threatened to snowball into a controversy.

The permission was granted but not before the ruling party accused the
Congress of trying to defame the BSP Government.

April 14 is the birth anniversary of Dr. Ambedkar and on that day the
Congress has planned to launch a 'rath yatra' programme in Uttar
Pradesh from Ambedkar Nagar to commemorate 125 years of its existence.
The Congress yatra would be flagged off by the party general
secretary, Rahul Gandhi.

BSP will conduct a day-long State wide dharna and demonstration
against the Women's Reservation Bill in its present form on April 14,
in addition to celebrating the Ambedkar birth anniversary.

The Congress had petitioned the Ambedkar Nagar district magistrate
seeking his permission for the party rally at the ground adjacent to
the air strip on April 14. However, reports from Ambedkar Nagar said
that permission might be denied as there was a possibility of the
Chief Minister arriving in the city on April 14 and since the ground
was very close to the airstrip it could create security problems. The
Congress should search for an alternate venue, reports quoting a BSP
Minister, Ram Achal Rajbhar from Faizabad said.

PWD Minister, Naseemuddin Siddiqui, however, accused the Congress of
raking up the controversy over the venue as it was worried that its
April 14 programme would flop. Mr. Siddiqui said written permission
for the Congress rally at the ground adjacent to the airstrip was
given by the Ambedkar Nagar district magistrate on Monday.

Mr. Siddiqui told reporters here on Monday that the needless
controversy was generated by the Congress in a bid to defame the
Government by making baseless allegations that obstacles were being
created by it.

The Congress was worried that the BSP's programme in Ambedkar Nagar
would be a bigger success and moreover, the Congress felt that it
would be unable to draw crowds for the proposed rally, the PWD
minister said. " The BSP does not believe in playing political games",
Mr. Siddiqui added.

He said the president of the Ambedkar Nagar district unit of the
Congress, Ram Kumar Pal had written two letters to the DM, dated,
March 24, 2010 and March 29, 2010 ( copies of the letters were
distributed to the Press ) seeking his permission for the rally and
public meeting at the air strip ground on April 14.

Simultaneously, the BSP district unit president, Chunni Lal Gautam,
submitted an application to the DM for celebrating Ambedkar "jayanti"
near his statue and permission for the day-long dharna and
demonstration. The permission for the BSP programme has also been
granted.

Incidentally, a distance of about 200 metres separated the proposed
Congress and BSP programmes. While the Ambedkar statue is situated on
the right side of the air strip, the ground is on its left side.


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[ZESTCaste] Ujjini dalits turn Brahmins for 15 days

http://www.expressbuzz.com/edition/story.aspx?Title=Ujjini+dalits+turn+Brahmins+for+15+days&artid=l2RGEnLeSxQ=&SectionID=7GUA38txp3s=&MainSectionID=fyV9T2jIa4A=&SectionName=zkvyRoWGpmWSxZV2TGM5XQ==&SEO=


By Devaraj B Hirehalli
30 Mar 2010 04:44:00 AM IST

Ujjini dalits turn Brahmins for 15 days

TUMKUR: Six dalits from Ujjini village in Kunigal, will be Brahmins
for an entire week marking the celebrations of the annual fair of
goddess Chowdeshwari.
Marking the second day of the Hindu calendar, the day after the Ugadi
festival, six male dalits will be chosen to be Brahmins for 15 days.
They will have to wear the 'janivaara' (sacred thread) during the ritual.
The dalits made to reside in the temple for those 15 days, should play
their role rightfully by abstaining from nonvegetarian food, during
the annual event.
Interestingly, most of the residents in this village predominantly eat
non-vegetarian food.
All the meat eaters are forbidden from consuming meat during these 15 days.
The six dalits will remove their janivaara on the fullmoon day, on
March 30, Tuesday.
This is not a simple affair.
The dalits who wear the sacred thread after at the ritual, will remove
the same only after they walk on live charcoal, which the Brahmins
call the 'Agni kunda'.
According to a belief, the dalits have been playing their part of
being a Brahmin to purify themselves off the sins they borne of their
forefathers.
The story behind this custom reads out that a dalit man married a
Brahmin girl, Hebbaramma.
After the couple had five children, the wife discovers that her
husband is a dalit, jumps into fire and kills herself.
Ever since, the dalits of Ujjini have been donning the role of the
'mythical' husband and children of Hebbaramma, and unfold the untold
story by being brahimns for 15 days. This year, Vade Lingaiah is one
among the group.
Celebrating the annual fair, the dalits are to worship Hebbaramma.
Brahmins will worship goddess Chowdeshwari, Vaishnavas the Anjaneya,
Lingayaths worship the twelfth century revolutionary Basavanna and the
Muslims will worship Babaiah.
There is no Muslim in the village. Five Hindu couples will play the
role of transitory Muslim couples to worship Babaiah, during the fair.


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[ZESTCaste] Fwd: review of Joothan

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Shiva Shankar <sshankar@cmi.ac.in>
Date: Tue, Mar 30, 2010 at 12:42 PM
Subject: review of Joothan
To:

One of the greatest books to come out of India:

Omprakash Valmiki's JOOTHAN: A DALIT'S LIFE (translated by Arun Prabha
Mukherjee)
                       ----------------------

'... Valmiki's narrative voice brims with a quiet sense of outrage at
what he had to endure as a human. Indeed, I'm inclined to see his
memoir as a form of Satyagraha: in reflecting back to others their own
violence and injustice, it attempts to shame them into introspection.
This is the kind of book that becomes 'the axe for the frozen sea
inside us.' More Indians ought to read it and let its hard edges get
to work inside them.'

Review By Namit Arora

A review of a memoir by an 'untouchable' starting in the 1950s in
rural Uttar Pradesh, India.

I grew up in the central Indian city of Gwalior until I left home for
college. This was the 70s and 80s. My father worked as a textile
engineer in a company town owned by the Birla Group, where we lived in
a middle class residential quarter for the professional staff and
their families. Our 3-BR house had a small front lawn and a vegetable
patch behind. Domestic helpers, such as a washerwoman and a
dishwashing woman, entered our house via the front door—all except
one, who came in via the rear door. This was the latrine cleaning
woman, or her husband at times. As in most traditional homes, our
squat toilet was near the rear door, across an open courtyard. She
also brought along a couple of scrawny kids, who waited by the
vegetable patch while their mother worked.

My mother often gave them dinner leftovers, and sometimes tea. But
unlike other domestic helpers, they were not served in our utensils,
nor did the latrine cleaners expect to be. They brought their own
utensils and placed them on the floor; my mother served them while
they stood apart. When my mother turned away, they quietly picked up
the food and left. To my young eyes this seemed like the natural order
of things. These were the mehtars, among the lowest of the so-called
'untouchables'. They worked all around us, yet were 'invisible' to me,
as if part of the stage props. I neither gave them much thought during
my school years, nor recognized my prejudices as such. I, and the kids
in my circle, even used 'untouchable' caste names as playful epithets,
calling each other chamaar and bhangi.

It's possible that I first reflected on the idea of untouchability
only in college, through art house cinema. Even so, upper caste Indian
liberals made these films and it was their viewpoint I saw. It is
hardly a stretch to say that the way even the most sensitive white
liberals in the US knew and described the black experience of America
is partly why one had to read Frederick Douglass, Ralph Ellison,
Richard Wright, James Baldwin, and other black authors. A similar
parallel holds for Native Americans, immigrants, and women, as well as
the 'untouchables,' now called Dalits ('the oppressed'), numbering one
out of six Indians. In recent years, they have begun to tell their own
stories, bearing witness to their slice of life in India. Theirs is
not only a powerful new current of Indian literature, it is also a
major site of resistance and revolt.

Joothan by Omprakash Valmiki is one such work of Dalit literature,
first published in Hindi in 1997 and translated into English by Arun
Prabha Mukherjee in 2003 (she added an excellent introduction in the
2007 edition). It is a memoir of growing up 'untouchable' starting in
the 1950s outside a typical village in Uttar Pradesh. Told as a series
of piercing vignettes, Joothan is also a remarkable record of a rare
Indian journey, one that took a boy from extremely wretched
socioeconomic conditions to prominence as an author and social critic.

§

Valmiki was born into the Chuhra caste (aka Bhangi), whose ordained
job it was to sweep the roads, clean the cattle barns, get shit off
the floor, dispose of dead animals, work the fields during harvests,
and perform other physical labor for upper caste people, including the
Tyagi Brahmins. The Tyagis didn't address them by name, only called
out, 'Oe Chuhre' or 'Abey Chuhre.' It was alright to touch cows and
stray dogs but touching a Chuhra inflicted instant 'pollution' on the
Tyagis. During his boyhood, his entire family worked hard, yet they
'didn't manage to get two decent meals a day,' not the least because
they often didn't get paid for their labor and instead 'got sworn at
and abused.'

The Chuhras were forced to live outside the village reserved for upper
caste people. A high wall and a pond segregated their brick houses in
the village from the Chuhra basti, or cluster of shanties. Upper caste
men and women of all ages came out and used the edge of the pond as an
open-air lavatory, squatting across from the Chuhra homes in broad
daylight with their private parts exposed. 'There was muck strewn
everywhere,' writes Valmiki. 'The stench was so overpowering that one
would choke within a minute. The pigs wandering in narrow lanes, naked
children, dogs, daily fights, this was the environment of my
childhood.'

In the rainy season, these narrow lanes of the basti filled up with
muddy water mixed-in with pigs' excrement; flies and mosquitoes
thrived. Everybody's arms and legs became mangy and developed itchy
sores. There was one drinking well in their basti for about thirty
families, and despite a guard wall around it, it became full of long
worms during the rainy season. They had no choice but to drink that
water, as they were not permitted to use the well of the upper caste
folks. Their homes were made of clay that sprang leaks all over.
During heavy rains, the ceilings or walls often collapsed, as it did
for Valmiki's house more than once. One season most of their homes
collapsed; as always, there was no outside help or insurance, and they
had to rebuild on their own.

What Valmiki had going for him was a headstrong set of parents,
determined to give him a better future. In 1955, despite Gandhi's work
on 'upliftment' and the new anti-discrimination laws on the books, his
father had a hard time getting him admission into a primary school.
When the boy finally got in, he was not allowed to sit on the benches
but on the floor, away from the upper caste boys, at the back by the
door, from where he couldn't see the blackboard well. Other boys
hurled epithets and beat him casually, turning him into a cowering
introverted kid. Even the teachers looked for excuses to punish him,
he writes, 'so that I would run away from the school and take up the
kind of work for which I was born.' In fourth grade, a new headmaster
arrived, who thrashed him almost daily and one day asked him to take a
broom and sweep all the rooms and the playground in school. The
hapless boy spent two full days sweeping, hoping it would soon be
over.

The third day I went to the class and sat down quietly. After a few
minutes the headmaster's loud thundering was heard: 'Abey Chuhre ke,
motherfucker, where are you hiding … your mother …' I had begun to
shake uncontrollably. A Tyagi boy shouted, 'Master Saheb, there he is,
sitting in the corner.'

The headmaster had pounced on my neck. The pressure of his fingers was
increasing. As a wolf grabs a lamb by the neck, he dragged me out of
the class and threw me on the ground. He screamed: 'Go sweep the whole
playground … Otherwise I will shove chillies up your arse and throw
you out of school.'

Frightened, I picked up the three-day-old broom [now only a cluster
of] thin sticks. Tears were falling from my eyes. I started to sweep
the compound while my tears fell. From the doors and windows of the
schoolrooms, the eyes of the teachers and the boys saw this spectacle.
Each pore of my body was submerged in an abyss of anguish.

As it turned out, his father was passing by that day and saw him
sweeping the grounds. Sobbing and overcome by hiccups, the boy told
him the story. Father snatched the broom and with eyes blazing, began
to scream, 'Who is that teacher, that progeny of Dronacharya, who
forces my son to sweep?' [1] All the teachers stepped out, including
the headmaster, who called his father names and roared back, 'Take him
away from here … The Chuhra wants him educated … Go, go … Otherwise I
will have your bones broken.'

On his way out, his father declared in a loud voice, 'I am leaving now
… but this Chuhre ka will study right here … In this school. And not
just him, but there will be more coming after him.' His father's
courage and fortitude left a deep and decisive mark on the boy's
personality. His father knocked on the doors of other upper caste men
he had worked for, hoping they would support him against the
headmaster, but the response was the opposite. He was plainly told:
'What is the point of sending him to school?' 'When has a crow become
a swan?' 'Hey, if he asked a Chuhra's progeny to sweep, what is the
big deal in that?' When his father had all but given up, one village
elder yielded to his tearful beseeching and intervened to get the boy
reinstated. A close call, else he would have ended up illiterate like
the rest of his family.

Most of his family worked at harvest time. For a hard day's labor,
which included harvesting lentils, cutting sheaves of wheat in the
midday sun, and transporting them via bullock carts, each person got
one out of 21 parts produced—about two pounds of wheat—as wages. For
the rest of their labor in the cowshed, they got paid in grain and a
leftover roti each day ('made by mixing the flour with the husk since
it was for the chuhras'), and at times scraps of leftovers from their
employer's plates, or joothan.

The Hindi word joothan, explains Mukherjee, 'literally means food left
on an eater's plate, usually destined for the garbage pail in a middle
class, urban home. However, such food would only be characterized
'joothan' if someone else besides the original eater were to eat it.
The word carries the connotations of ritual purity and pollution as
'jootha' means polluted.' Words like 'leftovers' and 'leavings' don't
substitute well, 'scraps' and 'slops' work better, though 'they are
associated more with pigs than with humans.' Joothan is also unfit for
consumption by anyone in the eater's family or in his own community.
Mukherjee writes:

The title encapsulates the pain, humiliation and poverty of Valmiki's
community, which not only had to rely on joothan but also relished it.
Valmiki gives a detailed description of collecting, preserving and
eating joothan. His memories of being assigned to guard the drying
joothan from crows and chickens, and of his relishing the dried and
reprocessed joothan burn him with renewed pain and humiliation in the
present.

The word actually carries a lot of historical baggage. Both Ambedkar
and Gandhi advised untouchables to stop accepting joothan. Ambedkar,
an indefatigable documenter of atrocities against Dalits [and an
'untouchable' himself], shows how the high caste villagers could not
tolerate the fact that Dalits did not want to accept their joothan
anymore and threatened them with violence if they refused it.

Valmiki describes one such incident, among the most powerful in the
text. His community looked forward to marriage feasts in the village
when they would gather outside with big baskets. After the guests had
eaten, 'the dirty pattals, or leaf plates, were put in the Chuhras'
baskets, which they took home, to save the joothan sticking to them.'
At the end of one such marriage feast, Valmiki's mother requested the
Brahmin host for additional food for her children, only to be
humiliated and told to mind her place, be satisfied with what she
already had collected, and to get going. Valmiki writes:

That night the Mother Goddess Durga entered my mother's eyes. It was
the first time I saw my mother so angry. She emptied the basket right
there. She said to Sukhdev Singh, 'Pick it up and put it inside your
house. Feed it to the baratis [marriage guests] tomorrow morning.' She
gathered me and my sister and left like an arrow. Sukhdev Singh had
pounced on her to hit her, but my mother had confronted him like a
lioness. Without being afraid.

His family fell on even harder times when his oldest brother and wage
earner got a high fever, and without access to a clinic, died. Valmiki
had finished fifth grade but their deepening poverty—they didn't even
have enough food—meant that he could not continue with school. He
dropped out and began tending buffaloes in the field, watching with a
heavy heart his schoolmates going to school. Over the protests of
others, his brother's widow pawned the only piece of jewelry she had,
a silver anklet, to pay for Valmiki's school—yet another close call.

Back in school, Valmiki continued to face severe discrimination.
Though he consistently did well in his studies, his memories of school
are suffused with pain and humiliation: from taunts and beatings by
schoolmates and teachers in a 'terror-filled environment', to his
exclusion from extracurricular activities like school plays; during
exams, he was not allowed to drink water from a glass when thirsty. He
had to cup his hands, and 'the peon would pour water from way high up,
lest our hands touch the glass.' At times, he writes, 'I feel I have
grown up in a cruel and barbaric civilization.' He does remember
fondly a couple of boys who befriended him and didn't let caste come
between them.

Remarkably enough, Valmiki was determined to make full use of the
school library; by the time he reached eighth grade, he had read
Saratchandra, Premchand, and Rabindranath Tagore, and relates this
poignant vignette.

I had begun to read novels and short stories to my mother in the faint
light of the wick lamp. Who knows how often Saratchandra's characters
have made a mother and son cry together? This was the beginning of my
literary sensibility. Starting from Alha, the Ramayana and the
Mahabharata to Sur Sagar, Prem Sagar, Premchand's stories, Kissa Tota
Maina … whatever I found, I, the son of an untouchable illiterate
family, read to my mother.

He studied in the light of a lantern in his intensely noisy
neighborhood. 'I was the first student of my caste,' writes Valmiki,
'not just from my basti but from all the surrounding villages of the
area, appearing for the high school exams,' and he felt the pressure
that came from their pride in him. His graduation became an occasion
for a feast in his community. He remembers that even one of the Tyagi
Brahmins came to his basti to offer congratulations, and later took
him home and fed him lunch in their own dishes while sitting next to
him. Valmiki's example inspired other children to show more interest
in education, and for a while he even ran evening classes in his
basti.

§

Unlike in the dominant Hindu tradition—which Valmiki pointedly
denigrates and wants no part of—widow remarriage was even in the 60s
an accepted norm in his community. He describes in some detail how
their gods were utterly different from Hindu gods and how different
their religious rituals were. [2] He also describes lots of family
drama and interpersonal politics in his community, not shying from
reproach where it is due, especially on their rank superstitions. He
writes about their jobs, suffering, and everyday struggle for dignity,
acknowledging that the women had an ever rawer deal than men.

Many Hindi writers and poets had written about the charms of village
life, observes Valmiki, but its 'real truth,' depicting the 'terrible
suffering of village life has not even been touched upon by the epic
poets of Hindi.' He also recounts other changes that were beginning to
take place. The young men of his community had begun to refuse to work
without wages. This soon escalated into an open confrontation with the
upper caste men who couldn't tolerate their nerve, and even got the
local police to beat them up. Valmiki calls this a turning point of
sorts; young men began departing from their basti to nearby towns and
cities.

Valmiki too left to pursue college education in the city of Dehradun,
where his brother and uncle worked. They all shared a single room in a
Bhangi basti. It was here that he encountered the works of Ambedkar,
which shook him up; he 'spent many days and nights in great turmoil.'
He grew more restless; his 'stone-like silence' began to melt, and 'an
anti-establishment consciousness became strong' in him. Ambedkar's
books, he writes, 'had given voice to my muteness,' and raised his
self-confidence. His rage grew sharper and he became more active in
college events, until his penury made him quit college and seek
technical training in an ordnance factory, with its promise of a shop
floor job that would judge him only for his work. But quitting college
made no dent whatsoever in his love of reading.

After a year of training, he got posted to the city of Jabalpur in
1968, moving in the ensuing years to Bombay and Chandrapur,
Maharashtra. The last third of his memoir is on this phase of his
life. Now he really came into his own: he met a bunch of Marxists,
read Chekov, Turgenev, Dostoevsky, Hemmingway, Zola, and other Western
writers. He joined a local theater group, saw Vijay Tendulkar's plays,
'read the entire works of Tagore and Kalidasa,' was drawn to the
Buddha's teachings, and discovered Marathi Dalit literature, the most
sophisticated in all of India, which energized him and forged his
literary consciousness. He began to publish poems and write a column
in a local weekly, later also plays and short stories. Almost two
decades later, he published Joothan. In its last two paragraphs, he
anticipates his critics:

Times have changed. But there is something somewhere that continues to
irk. I have asked many scholars to tell me why Savarnas [caste Hindus]
hate Dalits and Shudras so much?  The Hindus who worship trees and
plants, beasts and birds, why are they so intolerant of Dalits? Today
caste remains a pre-eminent factor in social life. As long as people
don't know that you are a Dalit, things are fine. The moment they find
out your caste, everything changes. The whispers slash your veins like
knives. Poverty, illiteracy, broken lives, the pain of standing
outside the door, how would the civilized Savarna Hindus know it?

Why is my caste my only identity? Many friends hint at the loudness
and arrogance of my writings. They insinuate that I have imprisoned
myself in a narrow circle. They say that literary expression should be
focused on the universal; a writer ought not to limit himself to a
narrow, confined terrain of life. That is, my being Dalit and arriving
at a point of view according to my environment and my socioeconomic
situation is being arrogant. Because in their eyes, I am only an SC,
the one who stands outside the door.[3]

Valmiki's narrative voice brims with a quiet sense of outrage at what
he had to endure as a human. Indeed, I'm inclined to see his memoir as
a form of Satyagraha: in reflecting back to others their own violence
and injustice, it attempts to shame them into introspection. This is
the kind of book that becomes 'the axe for the frozen sea inside us.'
More Indians ought to read it and let its hard edges get to work
inside them.

***

(Also consider reading my companion piece, The Blight of Hindustan,
which provides a brisk overview of the Indian caste system—its
origins, spread, and some historical attitudes and debates.)

_____________________

Notes:

1. Arun Prabha Mukherjee notes that 'Valmiki places his and his Dalit
friends' encounters with upper caste teachers in the context of the
Brahmin teacher Dronacharya tricking his low caste disciple Eklavya
into cutting his thumb and presenting it to him as part of his
gurudakshina, or teacher's tribute. This is a famous incident in the
Mahabharata. By doing this, Dronacharya ensured that Eklavya, the
better student of archery, could never compete against Arjun, the
Kshtriya disciple. Indeed, having lost his thumb, Eklavya could no
longer perform archery. In high caste telling, the popular story
presents a casteless Eklavya as the exemplar of an obedient disciple
rather than the Brahmin Dronacharya as a perfidious and biased
teacher. When Valmiki's father goes to the school and calls the
headmaster a Dronacharya, he links the twentieth-century caste
relations to those that prevailed two thousand years ago.'

2. Kancha Ilaiah attempts a more systematic exposition on the
sociocultural differences between the caste Hindus and the Shudras and
Dalits in his trenchant book, 'Why I Am Not a Hindu'.

3. SC stands for Scheduled Caste, the neutral-sounding administrative
term for the lowest castes, including the 'untouchables'.


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