The 'untouchables' of India.
The Wall Street Journal (Sept.19) has published a long report under the title, The 'untouchables', Converts to Christianity face extra bias, by Yaroslav Trofimov. Briefly,he makes the following points :
Under India's constitution Dalits are entitled to affirmative actions - federal government jobs and government-funded universities. These provide escape from traditional occupations - emptying village latrines, burying cow carcases, tanning animal hides. However, these facilities are only for Hindu dalits, not for those who are converted to Islam and Christianity. "The plight of India's secret converts, ignored for decades, is now at the forefront of national politics. Partly, driving the change is Indian Christians' new partnership with Islam, a religion frequently at odds with Christianity elsewhere in the world."
The Ranganath Mishra Commision concluded that Dalits retain their stigma even after converting and recommended scrapping the ban on privileges to non-Hindus."The United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination earlier also formally rebuked India for denying affirmative action benefits to Dalit converts Christianity and Islam and recommended that the prohibition be removed."
" The Government of India seems quite sympathetic" to such demands, says Sardar Buta Singh, a minister-level official who heads India's agency which overseeing Dait affairs, the National Commission for Scheduled Castes. " All the parties have started thinking about this problem, and it can be solve."
The report further states that the low status of Dalits is the punishment for sins in a previous life, according to Hindu scriptures, and they embraced caste-less religions. It adds, " .. great many Dalits are now turning to Christianity, attracted by benefits like education and health care that are sometimes offered by Western-funded congregations." The report then goes on say, " Much to the dismay of Hindu nationalist groups, the number of India's secret Christians has claimed in recent years to an estimated 25 million people, about the size of the officially registered Christian population."
The vote-bank politics has now global ramifications. An Indian commission urging reservation for converts and then an UN body recommending it, and an international daily high-lighting it. I sent some facts to put the issue in perspective to the newspaper which was not published, not even acknowledged .
The report has missed one important fact of life in India - Christianity and Islam in India are as caste-ridden as Hinduism. In spite of professing egalitarianism by these religions, many Christians and Muslim do not inter-marry. " In many Churches in Tamil Nadu, Harijans were seperated from the rest of the congregation by a screen. ..special parts of the cemeteries were set apart for them.." This is from the book, The Defeat of a Congresman ,by the famous BBC correspondent of yesteryears Mark Tully (Alfred A.Knoff,New York, 1991, see pages 63 &64 for more details).
This is what R.L.Francis, President of Poor Christian Liberation Movement (PCLM) has said, " On the one hand, the Church demands reservation for Dalit Christians from the government while on the other, it opposes and refuses to provide reservation in the Church structure." Missionaries have been the pioneers in introducing modern education in India and have a large number of educational institutions including medical and engineering colleges.
Contrary to what the author says, there is no scriptural sanction for caste system and the practice of untouchability in Hindu scriptures. Gita and Upanishads, the great scriptures of Hindus, proclaim that man is the spark of the Divine. Valmiki, the saint-poet who wrote Ramayana, was a hunter. Krishna, incarnation of God, was cow-herd. The caste system which started off as the division of labour solidified into rigid social structure due to the repeated invasions of India for almost a thousand years. Author has also not noticed the changes that have occurred in India since Independence. India had a Dalit President and many dalits have been ministers in the central and state governments. Almost 25 percent of the sweepers in the public rest-rooms in Delhi are Brahmins.
What Dalits and the poor in India require is education to empower them and not reservation or charity. This is where the government has failed them. The government is more bothered about the 'commanding heights' of the economy than serving the poor. Of course, the Church has not done much for the poor or dalits.
