The mighty caste system: Part - II

Roy believes the statistics Singh cited may be flawed, but are unlikely to be drastically flawed. She notes, “They are a quarter of a century old now. Some new census-based information would help, but is unlikely to be forthcoming because the government is not interested in including caste in the census.”

It is a common complaint of the Dalits that they don’t get justice from the courts. Roy, while citing a study, reveals 47 per cent of all Indian Supreme Court chief justices between 1950 and 2000 were Brahmins. “During the same period, 40 per cent of the associate justices in the high courts and lower courts were Brahmin.” It is not only some surveys that make such claims but a report by the Backward Classes Commission also revealed in 2007 that 37.17 per cent of the Indian bureaucracy was made up of Brahmins. “Most of them occupied the top posts.”

The Indian media has also been dominated by upper-caste Hindus. Perhaps it was this reason that forced Ambedkar to say in 1945 that the 'Untouchables have no press'. He bitterly complained, “The Congress Press is closed to them and is determined not to give them the slightest publicity.” It is asserted that in the past the staff of the Associated Press in India, which is the main news distributing agency in India, was entirely drawn from the Madras Brahmins. Dalits claim that indeed the whole of the press in India had been in Brahmin hands in the past because they were Congress supporters and they didn’t allow any news hostile to Congress to get publicity.

Roy quotes a 2006 survey by the CSDS on the social profile of New Delhi's media elite. She notes, “Of the 315-key decision-makers surveyed from thirty-seven Delhi-based Hindi and English publications and television channels, almost 90 per cent of the decision-makers in the English language print media and 79 per cent in television were found to be 'upper caste'. Of them, 49 per cent were Brahmins. Not one of the 315 was a Dalit or an Adivasi; only 4.0 per cent belonged to castes designated as Shudra, and 3.0 per cent were Muslim (who make up 13.4 per cent of the population). Of the four most important English national dailies, three are owned by Vaishyas and one by a Brahmin family concern.”

She notes that caste is also visible in the South Indian media landscape. “In southern India, caste manifests itself somewhat differently. For example, the Eenadu Group – which owns newspapers, the largest film city in the world and a dozen TV channels, among other things – is headed by Ramoji Rao of the Kamma peasant caste of Andhra Pradesh, which bucks the trend of Brahmin-Bania ownership of Big Media.”

India witnessed several riots and protests over the issue of reservations in universities and for jobs in state-run bodies for those who belong to Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. It is believed that reservation is the only opportunity Scheduled Castes have to break into the mainstream. But unfortunately, the policy does not apply to Dalits who have converted to other religions but continue to face discrimination.

Even benefitting from this reservation is very difficult for Dalits because to be eligible for the reservation policy, a Dalit needs to have completed high school but 71.3 per cent of Scheduled Caste students drop out before they matriculate, which means that even for low-end government jobs, the reservation policy only applies to one in every four Dalits. The minimum qualification for a white-collar job is a graduate degree. According to the 2001 Census, only 2.24 per cent of the Dalit population are graduates.

But detractors of Dalits assert that the liberalisation of the economy has provided ample opportunities to everyone. They assert it is because of this that Vaisyas, despite being low in the social hierarchy, made it to the list of richest Indians. But Roy believes this didn’t benefit Dalits, who constitute an overwhelming majority among India's poor. “In a nation of 1.2 billion, more than 800 million people live on less than Rs20 a day.

A list of dollar billionaires published by Forbes magazine a few years ago, features 55 Indians. The novelist noted the figures, naturally, are based on revealed wealth. “Even among these dollar billionaires, the distribution of wealth is a steep pyramid in which the cumulative wealth of the top ten outstrips the forty-five below them. Seven out of those top ten are Vaishyas, all of them CEOs of major corporations with business interests all over the world. Of the remaining forty-five, nineteen are Vaishyas too. The rest are for the most part Parsis, Bohras and Khatris (all mercantile castes) and Brahmins. There are no Dalits or Adivasis in this list.”

So, it seems that industrialisation in India didn’t bring the much-vaunted social reforms that could have put an end to social hierarchy based on caste and religion. It is also interesting to note that, while the Western bourgeoisie was anti-clergy and progressive, the business classes of the largest democracy are still very superstitious. From wedding dates to the inauguration of new projects, they are said to be heavily dependent on semi-literate religious leaders.

The Western bourgeoisie deprived the priests of political clout but the Indian bourgeoisie brought Yogi Adityanath into the power corridors of Lucknow by gifting him the crown of India’s most populous province. They also fund several religious places besides bankrolling a number of mystics with a medieval mindset.

Perhaps the Indian bourgeoisie believes that the inhuman religious and social hierarchy was one of the factors fueling their wealth which is why they don’t want to abolish this archaic system. They are trying to create an impression that this system is also open to the Dalits whose chamber of commerce is believed to be financed by upper-caste Hindu capitalists. But many among the Dalits believe that without radical change, emancipation is not possible. The solution doesn’t lie in enriching a few Dalits but in breaking the shackles created in the name of religion.

They also dismiss top government posts that are sometimes given to Dalits, arguing that until structural reforms are carried out, nothing will change. Many Dalit leaders believe that such change can only be brought through a violent revolution which can end Brahmin domination and capitalist supremacy.

Concluded

The writer is a freelance journalist who can be reached at:

egalitarianism444@gmail.com