Sixty-two years after discrimination against Dalit populations was officially outlawed in India, more than 165 million[1] Dalits continue to be victims of public humiliation, physical assault, custodial brutality, rape, kidnapping, dispossession of land and damaging of property. Dalit[2] women suffer simultaneously from gender-, caste- and class-based discrimination. Dalit women endure further oppressions specific to their position at the bottom of both gender and caste hierarchies, as described by India’s National Commission for Women: “in the commission of offences against… Scheduled Caste [Dalit] women the offenders try to establish their authority and humiliate the community by subjecting their women to indecent and inhuman treatment, including sexual assault, parading naked, using filthy language, etc.”[3]
However, in the face of this wide-spread oppression, a handful of Dalit women have recently risen to fill some of India’s most prestigious political posts. The most prominent current Dalit leader – male or female – is indisputably Mayawati Kumari,[4] champion of Dalit and women’s rights. Mayawati is the current Chief Minister of the State of Uttar Pradesh and the first Dalit woman chief minister in India, as well as the president of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP).[5] Mayawati recently made a bid for prime minister in the general elections of last month. Frontline describes her political success as “all the more stupendous given that she is a Dalit and a single woman working against the current in a deeply conservative, caste-ridden and socially and economically backward State like U.P. This is an outstanding accomplishment for Dalits and for women.”[6]
The significance of Mayawati’s achievement in the eyes of Dalit and women voters has not been lost on India’s other political parties. The ruling Congress Party nominated Dalit woman Meira Kumar as speaker of the Lok Sabha – the lower house of Parliament – last week, making her the first woman and the third Dalit to hold the position. The BJP followed suit by nominating a Tribal[7] woman, Karia Munda, to the position of Deputy Speaker. While these appointments have been derided as “blatant attempt(s) at social engineering,”[8] they are important first steps towards the political empowerment of Dalits and women.
[1]Human Rights Watch and The Center for Human Rights and Global Justice at New York University School of Law, “Hidden Apartheid: Caste Discrimination Against India’s ‘Untouchables,’” Human Rights Watch (C) 19, no. 3 (2007), p. 2
[2] “Dalits” are members former untouchable associated with degraded labor and located below the caste system.
[3] Aloysius S.J. Irudayum, Jayshree P. Mangubhai; Joel G. Lee, Dalit Women Speak Out: Violence Against Dalit Women in India, V.1, New Delhi, India: National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights (2006)
[4] For more information about Mayawati, see http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8000578.stm
[5] The BSP is a primarily Dalit-based party founded on the principles of radical social, political, and economic change and equitable political representation of marginalized communities. The party has formed the government in UP four times in coalition and now, as of the 2007 UP state assembly election, forms the first single-party majority government in the state since 1991, after 15 years of a hung assembly. (Maura Finn “The Moderation of Dalit Politics in North India” Barnard Political Science Thesis (April 2009))
[6] Praful Bidwai, “Creating History” Frontline, Vol. 24, no. 10 (May 19 – June 01, 2007)
[7] Tribal communities have historically been oppressed and ostracized in a similar manner as Dalits, and enjoy the same legal protections and affirmative action benefits as Dalits.
[8] Priya Sahgal, Amitabh Srivastav “Meira Kumar: Destiny’s Child; The UPA Plays a Trump Card and Makes Jagjivan Ram’s Daughter the First Woman Speaker,” India Today (2009, June)
