Caste and communalism

Indian political scene in particular, and global political scene in general have seen significant changes during last two decades. This has been a turbulent era when after the demise of Socialist states, end of cold war era and emergence of US as the single dominant power at the global scale has affected the political discourse. This paradigm shift has led to the undermining of democratic processes. This has also substituted the language of global politics from the one of rights, to the one of identity. Needless to say these have worsened the conditions of the weaker sections of society.

This period on one side saw the use of language of religion as a disguise for imperialist lust for control over oil resources, rise of reaction in the form of terrorism, demonization of Islam and Muslims and the wars against nations of oil rich zones. Interestingly during this period violence against the weak also has gone up at social level. While the World witnessed the US aggression against Iraq, Afghanistan and Iraq, the training of Al Qaeda by CIA through the ISI link on one hand, on the other we saw the violation of the authority of United Nations and its subsequent emasculation.

Coming home in India, we saw the adverse impact of globalization, rise of communal mobilizations, increase in the religiosity all around, strengthening of sectarian violence and increase in the atrocities against adivasi, dalits and women. The major threat posed to the Indian democracy is from the majoritarian Hindutva/RSS politics, which has also been the upholder of values of caste and gender hierarchy. While the anti Muslim violence has turned ghastly, anti Christian violence is sustained and scattered, the anti dalit violence comes in spurts reminding the persistence of Manu's code (the code of traditional Brahminical system) at various places. Along with the violence against these communities their political and social rights also come under attack in a subtle form.

This compilation focuses on the dalit issues in the present times, in the backdrop of the threat of adverse effects of globalization and the rising communalism. Dalits are a major victim of this phenomenon of rise of Hindutva. Hindutva cleverly masks its anti dalit agenda, while putting forward the threat to minorities at various levels. Globalization poses severe threat to empowerment and improvement in their lot in current times.