Latest News Update

Tuesday, March 8, 2011

[ZESTCaste] 2012: Maya banks on Kanshiram to keep her Dalit flock

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/2012-maya-banks-on-kanshiram-to-keep-her-dalit-flock/759827/

2012: Maya banks on Kanshiram to keep her Dalit flock

Sanjay Singh Posted online: Wed Mar 09 2011, 03:48 hrs
Lucknow : Ahead of the 2012 Assembly elections, Chief Minister
Mayawati has started giving special focus on her party's core votebank
of scheduled castes. After making it a point to visit Ambedkar
villages — the villages having a substantial Dalit population — during
her recent inspection tour across the state, Mayawati now wants to
reassure the Dalits the party has not deviated from the path of its
founder Kanshiram.

For this purpose, the BSP this year will organise celebrations on the
event of the birth anniversary of Kanshiram on March 15 at district
headquarters. "Keeping in mind the 2012 Assembly elections, the chief
minister has deliberately preferred to celebrate Kanshiram's birth
anniversary in districts, instead of holding a big rally in the state
capital as in the past," said a BSP leader.

The main concern of the BSP leadership is to remove the confusion, if
any, in the minds of party voters regarding party's efforts to pursue
Kanshiram's policy.

BSP sources said the party leadership is worried over the efforts by
Opposition parties, particularly the Congress, to make dents in the
BSP's core votebank by highlighting atrocities on Dalits, including
rape of Dalit women, and alleging that Chief Minister Mayawati had
deviated from the path of BSP founder Kanshiram.

The BSP cannot take it lightly as, earlier in the 2009 Lok Sabha
election, the party had seen its hold on certain Scheduled Communities
like Sonkar, Pasi, Balmiki and Nishad weakening. As a result, it could
win only two of the 17 reserved Lok Sabha seats in the state.

After that setback, to reassure the Dalits, the government had taken
several measures like quota for SCs/STs in government contracts and
special housing scheme for them. The BSP would use Kanshiram's birth
anniversary to remind the Dalits of these and other measures it has
taken for their welfare, said a BSP leader.

Besides the Opposition attacks, another factor that has troubled the
BSP leadership is reports about party MLAs not paying attention to the
problems faced by Dalits. "The MLAs who represent general seats tend
to take the SC support to the BSP for granted. In many constituencies,
there is resentment over this neglect," said a party leader. Zonal
coordinators of the party have been asked to identify such areas and
initiate corrective measures.

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[ZESTCaste] Khap lifts ban on women to attend its meetings

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Khap-lifts-ban-on-women-to-attend-its-meetings/articleshow/7653374.cms

Khap lifts ban on women to attend its meetings
Deepender Deswal, TNN | Mar 8, 2011, 12.39pm IST

SISANA (SONIPAT): On the eve of first International Women Day, in
1911, a panchayat of Dahiya khap (a Jat clan) held in Barona village
of Sonipat district to take steps for spreading education in society.
But in the same meeting, it also took a retrograde decision to impose
ban on venturing out of women in bazaars and attending the panchayats.

Later, it became a social norm in Haryana that no woman could attend
any panchayat and even enter in a chaupal (a village commonplace where
panchayat used to be held).

It took exactly a century for the Haryanavi women to break free the
age old shackles prevailing in the male dominated society when same
khap panchayat reverted its earlier diktats.

The Dahiya khap convened a panchayat on the eve of women day, to mark
1000 years of earlier panchayat, has made the participation of women
in decision making in every meeting of khap panchayat mandatory.

"The decision to engage women in the decision making process could
bring about a paradigm shift in the status of women in the state which
is notorious for skewed sex ratio due to social bias against the
girlchild and the honour killings," women activists reacted.

Tuesday's panchayat was presided over by the Pratap Singh and was
attended by 160 leaders of different khaps and tapas (clans and
regions) besides thousands of khap members mostly from the rural parts
including women.

Santosh Dahiya, a professor in the Kurukshetra university who had been
making efforts for ensuring the participation of women in khaps, while
addressing the gathering stated that without the involvement of women,
khap panchayats could not succeeded launching any kind of social
reforms. Proposing that the khap panchayats should register themselves
as NGOs, Dahiya stated, "The khap panchayats must evolve its decision
making process by taking women on its board. The diktats being issued
by any khap panchayat other than the registered one should be
condemned and rejected."

Another women speaker, Suresh Boora, principal of a government women
college in Kharkhoda town stressed, "Gender bias has been inherent in
the decisions taken in the khap panchayats so far. The khap panchayats
could get wider acceptability and validation only if women are
involved in the process."

Madhu Kishwar, a women rights activist who was present in the
panchayat maintained it could be a positive initiative towards
empowerment of women. "The khap panchayats are better than the NGOs in
the present context. If it works with honesty and give equal status to
women in its process, khap could very effective. It's good that they
have taken up issues like female feoticide, honour killing, dowry
harassment and oppose lavish show of money in marriage functions,
which are all related to women."

Surender Dahiya, convener of the panchayat informed that the meeting
had adopted 25 resolutions in the meeting comprising stress on
education and employment in youths, awakening youth against drug
addiction, spreading brotherhood among all the communities and castes
besides the women related issues. "The meeting had resolved to form
village-wise committees in every khap to awaken the society against
the prevailing social evils. These committees would have equal number
of men and women representation," he informed. He, however, added that
so far the proposal of registering the khaps as NGOs have been kept
pending which will be discussed in the next meeting at a wider scale.

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[ZESTCaste] Casteist remark against Dalit can't be compromised: SC

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/casteist-remark-against-dalit-cant-be-compromised-sc/759054/

Casteist remark against Dalit can't be compromised: SC

Agencies Posted online: Mon Mar 07 2011, 21:02 hrs
New Delhi : Calling a Dalit by his caste is a serious offence that
cannot be condoned even if both the accused and the complainant arrive
at a compromise, the Supreme Court said.

A bench of justices Markandeya Katju and Gyan Sudha Mishra said the
only way of ending the feudal mentality of those insulting the Dalits
would be by sending them to the jail so as to act as a deterrent for
others.

"The only way is to send you to the jail. This is modern age. The days
of feudalism are over," the bench said while refusing to compound
(close the case by way of fine) the dispute as sought by counsel S D
Dwaraknath.

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[ZESTCaste] Mirchpur Dalit killings: Name those who led stir after accused booked, SC tells Haryana govt

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Mirchpur-Dalit-killings-Name-those-who-led-stir-after-accused-booked-SC-tells-Haryana-govt/articleshow/7651247.cms

Mirchpur Dalit killings: Name those who led stir after accused booked,
SC tells Haryana govt
PTI | Mar 8, 2011, 06.25am IST

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday asked the Haryana government to
identify the persons and organisation responsible for holding
demonstration in December last against booking of some upper caste
people in connection with the Mirchpur Dalit killings case.

A bench of justices GS Singhvi and AK Ganguly also directed the
government and the Railway Board to spell out steps taken by them to
recover financial loss caused following the 11-day stir organised by
12 khap
panchayats.

"Who are the persons behind it? You must tell us the names of the
persons and the party who were behind all these agitations. There must
have been some kind of political backing behind it," the bench said
while granting two weeks' time to reply.

Not impressed by the response of the state government that cases have
been filed, the court said, "Forget about cases. We know what happens
after case is registered. State must tell us who is responsible for
this (agitation)." Villagers had been protesting the booking of 98
members of their community in the case relating to the killing of
70-year-old Tarachand and his physically challenged teenaged daughter
Suman at Mirchpur village in Hisar on April 21 last year.

Demanding a fresh probe into the Dalit killings, upper caste people of
Mirchpur and adjoining villages had brought the rail and road traffic
to Delhi via Jind to a grinding halt earlier this month.

On the last hearing the state government had informed the court that
loss of Rs 45.92 lakh was caused to the transport department due to
agitation and Rs 90,000 were spent by forest department in removing
3130 trees which were uprooted by protesters.

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[ZESTCaste] Haryana police pulled up by Delhi courtfor "discrepancies"

http://ibnlive.in.com/generalnewsfeed/news/haryana-police-pulled-up-by-delhi-courtfor-discrepancies/600705.html

Haryana police pulled up by Delhi courtfor "discrepancies"
PTI | 09:03 PM,Mar 07,2011

New Delhi, Mar 7 (PTI) A Delhi court today pulled up the Haryana
police for "discrepancies", including the number of accused, in
records relating to the killing of two Dalits at Mirchpur village in
the state last year. "There is a lot of confusion about the records
which are placed before this court. Something is missing as the
records do not even show the date of arrest of some of the accused.The
Investigation Officer shall clarify the discrepancies in the records
on March 9," Additional Sessions Judge Kamini Lau said. The court said
the records did not suggest various facts relating to the number of
accused and how some of them were discharged by a judicial magistrate
that too in a murder case. "Out of 49 accused, charges were framed
only against 37 and rest 12 were discharged by the judicial
magistrate. There is no judicial record regarding their date of
arrest, filing the chargesheet and subsequent framing of charges," it
said. The court also said the records do not reveal that apart from
those 49 accused, when others joined the investigation and judicial
proceedings. "Whether the rest of the accused joined the proceedings
after framing of charges on September 6, 2010 or not, it is not clear
from the records," the court said. Earlier, the court had asked the
Haryana government to deploy CRPF at Mirchpur village to protect the
witnesses till they record their testimonies in the case. It had taken
exception to the belated deployment of CRPF at the village where the
community members of the accused are protesting against the shifting
of the trial from Haryana to Delhi. The Supreme Court had earlier
directed that the case relating to the killing of a 70-year-old Dalit
man and his physically-challenged daughter allegedly by a mob of over
100 upper caste people be transferred to the special court here to
ensure a free and fair trial. 97 accused were transferred to Tihar
from a Hissar jail this month on a direction of the court. Out of 103
accused, five are juveniles and one is out on bail. On April 21 last
year, a Dalit man and his daughter were burnt alive in violence
against the community allegedly by members of an upper caste, forcing
about 150 families to flee Mirchpur village in Hissar.