First time ever, communities shake hands past TN's 'untouchability wall'
Gopu Mohan Posted online: Mon Oct 24 2011, 02:49 hrs
Chennai : Two decades after the infamous "untouchability wall" came up
in Uthapuram near Madurai, a influential backward community and Dalits
signed an agreement last week that may pave the way for a new
beginning in this village.
The Dalits will now get access to the Muthalamman temple in Uthapuram,
where they were not allowed so far, and the holy tree in its vicinity.
In keeping with another demand of theirs, land would soon be
identified and construction taken up of a bus shelter on the main
road.
In the severely casteist rural heartland of Tamil Nadu, the Dalits of
Uthapuram were not permitted to stand on the road to wait for a bus.
Instead, they had to wait in the inner streets and run to the main
road when they heard an approaching bus.
After the existence of the wall was brought to public and media
attention by the 'Tamil Nadu Untouchability Eradication Front' three
years ago, the then DMK government had reopened a road from the main
road to the Dalit hamlet, which the wall had blocked. A portion of the
wall was demolished on May 6, 2008, after the intervention of CPM and
human rights organisations.
However, fearing reprisals from the influential Pillaimars, the Dalits
never used the road connected them to the main road after the police
left.
The agreement signed on Thursday at the district police office was
made possible by the intervention of the district authorities,
especially the rural police headed by Superintendent Asra Garg, who
held a series of meetings with the elders of the two communities over
the past few weeks. "We involved their leaders not just from the
Uthapuram village but from the neighbouring region as well. We
impressed upon them the need to resolve outstanding issues," Garg told
The Indian Express.
Following the agreement, the cases against members of both the
communities related to clashes between them would be withdrawn.
While there had been major clashes between the Dalits and Pillaimars
in 1948 and 1964 as well, the 'caste wall' came up after one such
conflict in 1989.
Five people died in the 1989 clash, following which elders from 18
neighbouring villages met and decided that a wall be constructed to
physically separate the two communities. The wall came up right in the
middle of the Dalit hamlet, blocking their access to the main road.
Only a small pathway was left leading up to the Dalit area inside the
village.
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