Dalit News on the World Wide Web

Sex hell of Dalit women expose

A new report on the plight of lower caste women in rural India reveals a depressing portrait of rape, sexual abuse and harassment, and suggests that it is virtually impossible for victims even to file a complaint at a police station, let alone achieve justice. An "extremely high" number of sexual assaults takes place on women from desperately poor Dalit or tribal communities - often by landlords, upper caste villagers and police--- The Guardian

Govt accused of terrorising dalits, Muslims

TIMES NEWS NETWORK LLAHABAD: The national general secretary of Lok Parivartan Party Javed Iqbal lambasted chief minister Rajnath Singh and accused his government of unleashing a rein of terror on Dalits and minorities in the state. Talking to newsmen, Iqbal stated that between January and November this year 197 dalits and Muslims had been gunned down Times of India

The Rediff Interview/Dr Kancha Ilaiah

Dr Kancha Ilaiah, associate professor of political science at Hyderabad's Osmania University, is known for his fierce attacks on Hindu religious and political leaders. In 1996, his first book Why I am not a Hindu was accused of inflaming communal passions. Last month, he published another controversial tract, God as a Political Philosopher: Buddha's Challenge to Brahminism. Dr Ilaiah, 48, says his tirade against Hinduism stems from the inhuman and humiliating caste-ridden conditions in which he was born and brought up. Rediff.news

Brutal attacks on dalits

They beat his legs with stones and a heavy iron bar from a tractor. They stuffed his mouth with a cloth so that he could not cry out and took money and food from him. Amnesty International

Dalits boycott community lunch

TIMES NEWS NETWORK IJAYAWADA: Even as the social welfare department in Krishna district has pronounced the government's drive against untouchability a "grand success", Dalits in Eturu village in Chandarlapadu mandal have boycotted a community lunch programme on November 3. Times of India

Slavery, then and now

DEVAKI JAIN A GRIPPING aspect of the words, the stories and the anger in Durban was the reference to slavery. The words discrimination and racism seemed to be overshadowed by the word slavery — the terrible experience of being bought and sold not only by others but by ourselves. The Indian Express

Society still discriminates Dalits

Kathmandu, Mar. 27 (RSS):Whether or not you allow a person from the Dalit community into your house is completely your personal discretion, but mind you, you may be in for an embarrassing situation if you start discriminating people on the basis of their caste at a public place or an eatery. A tea-stall owner at a village near the capital who abused a Dalit man for failing to wash the glass from which he drank tea faced such a situation here Sunday and he had to close his shop and flee after a group of about 100 Dalits picketed his shop protesting his action. Nepal News

Untouchable?

Veerasamy takes in washing for his living. He lives in a small village in southern India where all the inhabitants are Dalits - outcasts or 'Untouchables' as they're known in India. But even among the dalits, there are divisions, and Veerasamy belongs to the lowest scale of the hierarchy. The only payment he receives for back-breaking work, washing and steaming and drying the laundry of the village's 19 families One World

Landlord urinated in my mouth, alleges Dalit

The incident soon took a sensational turn as hundreds of Dalits met the district magistrate, alleging perpetration of atrocities by upper caste landlords. Manjhi, meanwhile, filed a complaint in the court of the chief judicial magistrate, alleging that he had been falsely implicated because he refused to work on the landlord's fields on paltry wages. He has alleged that the Shahis dragged him out of their house, tied him to a pole and shaved his head. Further, the Dalit prisoner has alleged that one of the landlords forced Manjhi to drink his (landlord's) urine. Times of India