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From: "Shaji John K" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Interviews with Dalit Activists Swapan K.Biswas is a senior Delhi-based government officer. He has written some 20 books in Bengali and English on Dalit history, religion and politics. In this interview with Yoginder Sikand he talks about the role of Buddhist liberation theology in the Dalit struggle. Q: Could you tell us about your background and how you got involved in Dalit activism? A: I was born in a Namashudra Bengali family, and was educated in Calcutta. Although the Namashudras are Scheduled Castes, as a child I had little knowledge or experience of untouchability and caste oppression. I would often argue with my father, saying, "What are you talking about caste? There's no such thing as caste discrimination nowadays". But he would say, "You are still a child. When you grow up you will realise that caste and untouchability are still very much alive". When I was in college, a commission was instituted by the government to de-schedule five castes, among which one was the Namashudras, on the alleged grounds that they had progressed enough so as to warrant removing them from the Scheduled Caste list. That provoked me to think that if these castes were de-scheduled so many poor people who have nothing would suffer. So, I, along with my friends, began mobilising protests against the commission. That was how I got involved in Dalit activism. Q: How did you take to writing about Dalit issues? A: Well, I first began by working with Dalit organisations in West Bengal. In Calcutta, we set up the West Bengal Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe Students and Youth Organisation. Thereafter, I got associated with other Dalit organisations. But in all these organisations my experience was that their members fight among themselves for petty gains, because for centuries they have had nothing, and so when they get a few crumbs they start quarreling. Hence, I decided, instead, that I must do something that will have a permanent, long-lasting influence and impact. So, I took to writing. In 1984 I developed a serious problem in my vocal chord and thought it was cancer. So, I thought I should record what I wanted to say for posterity. That is when I took up my pen, and wrote my first book in English, which was about the Dalits as the original inhabitants of India. Q: Most of your writings deal with Dalit history. Why do you think project of writing history from a Dalit perspective is so crucial ? A: As I see it, history plays a central role in giving communities a sense of identity, linking them up with their past heroes. And for an oppressed community like the Dalits, this is of great importance as a symbolic resource in their struggle for liberation. Now, almost all the writings that we have on Indian history, on caste and religion has been the product of Brahmin writers, who have presented a very biased and distorted picture and have completely invisibilised the Dalits. Indian history has, so far, been by and large written from a Brahminical-Aryan perspective. I want my own people to write their own histories, to know their past as it actually was, not as the Brahminical scholars would have us believe. Q: What role do you see religion as playing in the Dalit struggle for liberation? A: Religion plays a very vital role in our struggle. The Dalits suffer principally because of religion鈥攖he Hindu or Brahminic religion to be precise. Hinduism is simply another name for the caste system. According to Ambedkar, Hinduism or Brahminism has for centuries been locked in a war with Sramanism, or anti-Brahminical religions such as Buddhism. He believed, and rightly so, that as long as Hinduism remains the caste system, caste oppression and untouchability will remain in some form or the other. So, for him, without the destruction of Brahminism the Dalits cannot gain their liberty. Hence, the Dalits, he stressed, must convert to any egalitarian religion for winning their self-respect. Q: To which religion? A: Ambedkar converted to Buddhism and I see that as the way. Q: But has conversion to Buddhism actually helped the Mahars of Maharashtra or the Jatavs of Agra to improve their social status? A: The Maharashtra or Agra Buddhists are not really following Ambedkarism or Buddhism fully. They still retain many Hindu customs, practices and belief. Dr. Ambedkar died just three months after his conversion in 1956. Had he lived for a little longer, he would have been able to carry forward the conversion movement to its logical culmination. But that did not happen. So, their conversion has been only partial. But I believe that as the Dalits begin to assert themselves more forcefully for their rights in the political, economic and social spheres, the Buddhist conversion drive will be strengthened and their conversion will be more complete. Q: How was Dr. Ambedkar's interpretation of Buddhism different from the other forms of Buddhism? A: Ambedkar says somewhere in his writings that his Buddhism is neither Mahayana nor Hinayana but Navayana which means `the new path'. But it was not new in the, sense of being his own invention. Rather, it is the original Buddhism, which both the Mahayanists and the Hinayanists had deviated from, having spiritualised Buddhism and watered down its radical socialist thrust. I have tried to show in my latest book: "Buddhism: The Religion of the Moenjodaro and Harappa Cities", that the sort of Buddhism that Ambedkar advocated was, in fact, rooted in the ancient sramanic tradition that predates Gautama Buddha. According to some sources, prior to Gautama Buddha there were 27 Buddhas or `enlightened ones' who challenged the Brahminic system, and the earliest of them were products of the pre-Aryan Indus Valley Civilisation, which, I have shown, was a civilisation of the ancestors of the Dalits of today. Q: What is the essence of Ambedkar's Buddhism? A: Ambedkar sees the basic message of the Buddha as freedom-freedom from imaginary gods, freedom from Brahminical control and slavery, and freedom of oppressed communities. Today, the Dalits are fighting a battle for freedom. That is why the Ambedkar took refuge in the Buddha. That is why so many Dalits are now going in for Buddhism, because in this battle Buddha is on their side. As I see it, in his own time the Buddha was himself fighting a battle for liberation. His land had come under the suzerainty of Prasenjit, the king of Kosala. As a man, then, the Buddha was suffering the same sort of subjugation as I am suffering today as a Dalit, and so I can readily identify with him. The Buddha fought for liberation, not to be a king, but to see that no human being is enslaved. That is his basic message. This comes out very strikingly in the Jatakas and other texts describing the Buddha's life. Once, when the Buddha was travelling through a forest with his bhikkhus (monks), he saw a group of Licchavis passing by. He turned to the monks and said to them: `O Bhikkhus! Those of you who have not seen celestial beings, see these Licchavis, because they are like them, for they are free and their land has never been subdued'. Q: Buddhism is said to preach absolute non-violence. How does that square with Dalit assertion? A: It is really a misreading of Buddhism to claim that it advocates absolute non-violence. The Buddha never preached weakness or passivity. In fact, he advocated martial training for maintaining one's liberty. Some of the famous martial arts of China were developed by Buddhist monks as a means of self-defence. In the Buddhist scriptures there is the story of the Buddha once being approached by one of his disciples who told him that Prasenjit, king of Kosala, was going to attack the Licchavis and defeat them. The Buddha replied that the Licchavis sleep on wooden planks, keeping their heads on wooden pillows and under take vigorous military training the whole day, and that as long as they keep on doing this they can never be defeated. This story thus suggests that the Buddha did advocate armed training for preserving freedom. On the other hand, at several places the Buddha says that dependence is the root of sorrow. So, to my mind, Buddhism's fundamental message is that of liberty, freedom and independence, which is exactly what the Dalits are today struggling for. The importance that the Buddha placed on independence is clearly evident in his exhortation to one of his disciples, Ananda, when he said: `O Ananda! Do not be like a satellite or the moon, simply reflecting the light of the sun. Instead, be your own light'. Another very well-known saying of the Buddha is that his disciples should not take anything of what he says as gospel truth without subjecting it to the scrutiny of their own reason and conscience. Judge everything for yourself, he said, and then decide if you want to accept what I say or not. Q: How did the concept of absolute non-violence then get associated with Buddhism? A: This happened after the Buddha's death, principally due to Mahayanist and Brahminic influence, which resulted in a distortion of the original teachings of Buddhism. And because of this process, the Buddha was absorbed into Hinduism as the tenth incarnation of Vishnu. The other nine avatars, if you look at their images, are all fiercely armed, and their principal function, if you carefully analyse the Brahminical scriptures, was to preserve and promote the caste system and to forcibly suppress any challenge to the supremacy of the Brahmins. This Parasurama did by killing off all the Kshatriyas because they dared to defy the Brahmins. Krishna did the same when he exhorted Arjuna to go and wage war to preserve the varna dharma, the caste system. This Rama did when he beheaded the Shudra saint Shambhukh, whose only `crime' was to immerse himself so deeply in meditation that he was about to ascend to the heavens. But the only so-called incarnation of Vishnu who is not armed is the Buddha. By attributing absolute non-violence to him the Brahminical establishment used his figure to accomplish the same task as the armed 'incarnations' had done鈥攄isarming the Dalits and making them passively accept Brahminical hegemony. Q: As long as the Dalits remain attached to Hinduism, however nominally so, do you think the Dalit liberation project can be realised? A: No, that cannot be, because Brahminism, which is just another word for what is today called Hinduism, is itself predicated on the subjugation of the Dalits and the hegemony of the Brahmins. If a Dalit calls himself a Hindu it means he accepts the caste system, because Hinduism ordains, right from the Vedas and the Puranas down to the dharamshastras, that the dharma or religious duty of the Dalits is to be willing slaves of the so-called upper castes. That is their jati dharma, and this is what the varnashrama dharma, which is the actual name of the religion that is today called Hinduism, is all about. This is what I call `divine slavery'. Q: What do you have to say about the development in Christian circles of what is today called Dalit Christian theology? A: As I see it, Christianity has done very little for the Dalits. See the elitist Christian schools. Whom are they educating? The Dalit poor or the children from rich, `upper' caste Hindu families? The Christian missionaries never did anything by way of facilitating any consciousness among the Dalits of their Dalit-hood. Now they are talking about Dalit consciousness, but it's unnecessary, because the Dalits have begun talking about it themselves. Perhaps at the back of the minds of some Christians who are now talking so passionately about the Dalits is a desire to hijack or co-opt the Dalit movement. Otherwise, if they were really concerned about our plight, why did they never speak about it all these years? Why is it that now that the Dalits have started becoming more conscious they are talking about it? Now, when I can speak for myself, I really do not need any spokesmen to speak on my behalf. When I needed them they were not there, but now when I don't need them they are here offering their services. I also have problems with certain Muslim groups who are now talking about Dalit-Muslim unity. For eight hundred years, `upper' caste Pathan and Mughal Muslims, along with the Sayyeds and Shaikhs, ruled over India in collaboration with `upper' caste Hindus, but they did nothing for the Dalits, not even for those millions of Dalits and Shudras who converted to Islam to escape from Brahminical oppression. But now that the `upper' caste Muslims have lost their power, they are talking about Dalit-Muslim unity. But this does not mean that I am opposed to such unity. In fact, I am all for a grand unity of all oppressed groups, and that includes the overwhelming majority of the Muslims, 95% of whom are converts from the Dalits and the Shudras. We are blood-brothers and blood-sisters and we are co-sufferers, both victims of the same Brahminical system. In my opinion the hatred of Muslims on which the Hindutva project is based has much to do with the fact that the vast majority of the Indian Muslims are of Dalit-Shudra background, and their ancestors dared to challenge Brahminical hegemony by converting to Islam. I do not see the Brahminical establishment as having really any animosity against the `upper' caste Muslim minority. After all, for eight hundred years they shared power together and there was no instance of any Hindu-Muslim rioting in that long period. So, I would say that the targeting of Muslims by the Hindutva forces so as to construct an artificial `Hindu' unity emanates from two sources: the Dalit-Shudra origins of most of the Indian Muslims, and the growing assertion of the Dalits and Shudras against 'upper' caste hegemony, because of which their wrath is being sought to be diverted onto the Muslims instead. Q: Besides Buddhism, what other sources of inspiration have you drawn upon in your writings to develop a Dalit liberation theology? A: Buddhism is the primary source, but we are also looking at and reclaiming the numerous Dalit heroes who down the centuries have dared to challenge Brahminical hegemony. Some, like Shambhukh, were killed for this, others, such as Kabir, have been subtly Brahminised and their radical message of social equality blunted by being spiritualised out of recognition. We have started a project called Kahin Ham Bhool Na Jai (`Lest We Should Forget'), under which we are collecting the stories of one hundred brave Dalit heroes, including Dalit saints, who spent their lives challenging caste oppression. We need to link up with this tradition of ours, to give us a sense of history and identity, a feeling of pride in our ancestors and our heritage, a spirit of struggle and a tradition of revolt against Brahminical hegemony. In order to do this in a systematic manner and to re-write our histories, we have set up the Dalit History Congress, of which I am the convenor. Our aim is to provide our people with historical resources so that they can develop a sense of pride in who they are and who their ancestors were, because as long as they are ignorant of their past achievements they can hardly resist the temptation to deny their roots, to deny their Dalit-ness. The Hindu religion has taught us to hate ourselves, but what we are trying to do in re-writing our history and developing our own theologies is to take pride in ourselves, and only on that basis can our project of liberating our people from slavery succeed. --------------------------------------------------- 2] Interview: Bhagwan Das on Dalit Religious Traditions and the Hindutva Challenge Bhagwan Das is a Delhi-based Dalit lawyer. Author of numerous books on Dalit history and Ambedkarism, he is associated with several Dalit organisations. In this interview with Yoginder Sikand he speaks about the religious traditions of the sweeper community to which he belongs and about the challenges to the Dalit movement from Hindutva, which he identifies as the contemporary face of Brahminism. Q: How did you get involved in the Dalit movement? A: I was born in an Untouchable family in Himachal Pradesh. My father used to work as a sweeper in a post office. My mother was also from a sweeper family, but one which was semi-Muslim. I had the opportunity to meet Dr .Ambedkar on several occasions. I first met him in Bombay in 1943. After I joined the Air Force and got a posting in Bombay, I would regularly go to his house to meet him, three times a week. I would do the paper work that he would give me-making clippings from newspapers, typing, procuring information that he required from different offices and so on. So, that is how I began getting involved in the Dalit struggle. When Dr .Ambedkar converted to Buddhism in 1956, I followed in his footsteps and in 1957 and embraced Buddhism along with my family. Q: Why did Dr .Ambedkar convert to Buddhism? A: The Dalits have never been Hindus, because, being outcastes, they are outside the four-fold Hindu caste system. Buddhism, according to Dr. Ambedkar, was the original religion of the Dalits. It is a religion of freedom and liberation. Dr. Ambedkar believed, and rightly so, that all major social and political revolutions have been preceded by cultural and religious revolutions, and so for the Dalit struggle conversion was a fundamental necessity. We Dalits have never been Hindus. Actually, we had our own religious systems quite distinct from Brahminical beliefs and practices. Take the case of my own community, the sweepers (Bhangis). Their status was ambiguous. They were neither Hindus nor Muslims. It was difficult to place us anywhere because we did not worship any Hindu gods and nor did we go to mosques to pray. We had our own folk heroes whom we worshipped, but this tradition is now fast being forgotten, because Hindu organisations are desperately trying to Hinduise us. We sweepers had our own patron saint called Lal Beg. Later, the Arya Samajists tried to convert us into Hindus by claiming that we were descendants of Valmiki, the author of the Ramayana, but I, for one, never accepted this myth. Q: Who was Lal Beg? A: Some say that Lal Beg was actually Lal Bhikku, who could have been a Buddhist saint. If you read the prayers of the sweeper community of northern India which are dedicated to Lal Beg you get a very interesting picture. These prayers are called Kursi Namas. They were collected together by Youngson and published in The Indian Antiquaries. They read like the first book of the Genesis in the Old Testament, tracing the lineage of our heroes. The Kursi Namas very clearly tell us that the sweepers are neither Hindus nor Muslims. There is no mention of any Hindu gods like Rama or Krishna in them. But, very interestingly, the Kursi Namas all begin with the Qur'anic invocation Bismillah-ir-Rahman-ir-Rahim (`In the Name of Allah, the Most Merciful, the Most Compassionate'), which is the standard Islamic form with which every verse of the Qur'an but one begins. And, they all end with the cry, which again is very Islamic, of `Bolo Momino Vohi Ek Hai!' [Say, O believers, that He alone is the One True Being!]. Now, at several places in the Kursi Namas, the names Lal Beg and Bala Shah are used interchangeably. Bala Shah was a leading Punjabi Sufi saint. The Punjabi Sufi Waris Shah writes in his Heer, which is really an encyclopedia of the Punjab of his times, that Bala Shah was the Pir or Sufi preceptor of two so-called low castes, the sweepers or Chuhras and the Pasis [Bala Pir Ai Churiyan Pasiyan Da]. Q: Are the sweepers still aware of this tradition? A: Unfortunately, very few are, and this tradition is fast disappearing. One reason is because Hindu organisations have been sparing no effort to absorb the sweepers into the Hindu fold so as to increase Hindu numbers. They were afraid that otherwise the sweepers would all convert to Christianity, a process that began in 1873 and continued right until 1931. So, they used all means to prevent the conversion of the sweepers. As part of this broader agenda, they started selling the story that the sweepers are actually Valmikis, descendants of Valmiki, the author of the Ramayana. In order to convince the sweepers of their claims, they argued that Bala Shah, the other name for Lal Beg, was actually just a corrupted form of the name Valmiki. O: But how could that be, considering that in the Ramayana Valmiki legitimises the caste system? He tells us that Rama beheaded the Shudra Shambukh simply because he was meditating in order to ascend to the heavens in his physical body? A: Exactly, so it is just a myth. The problem with this so-called Valmiki connection is: which Valmiki are they talking about? The Brahminical Valmiki who is a Brahmin and claims to be the tenth son of Varuna? Or the Valmiki mentioned in the Puranas as a dacoit? The Valmiki who wrote the Ramayana champions the caste system, so how could he have been a sweeper? He was actually a Brahmin. The problem with the alleged connection between this Valmiki and the sweepers is that at least when the Chamars claim Ravidas there's a link between the two, and so is the case with the claims of the Julahas and Bunkars [weavers] vis-a-vis Kabir, but there is absolutely nothing to link the Valmiki of the Ramayana with the sweepers. Q: Has the attempted Sanskritisation of the sweepers by taking recourse to this mythical connection between them and Valmiki actually succeeded in improving their social status? A: No, not at all. I would not call this process Sanskritisation. Rather, it was a cheap imitation of certain Brahminical customs and rituals. Sanskritisation does not result in any social mobility for the sweepers. The trouble with caste is that if you try to throw it out from the front door, it creeps back again through the window or the back door. This has been the fate of conversion movements among the Dalits to Christianity, Sikhism and Islam as well, although these religions, in theory, are egalitarian, unlike Hinduism. As I see it, what is called Sanskritisation may result in some superficial changes of customs and names, but it does not result in any change in the attitudes of the so-called `upper' castes towards the Dalits. That has been the experience of the sweepers who now claim to be Valmikis. So, if a sweeper begins to call himself a Valmiki or a Chamar a Ravidasi or Ad-Dharmi or a carpenter a Vishwakarma, this makes no fundamental change in the attitudes of the Hindus towards them. Q: What implications do you see Sanskritisation having for the Dalit liberation struggle? A: Sanskritisation, to my mind, is simply another name for conversion of the Dalits to Hinduism, or, to be more precise, Brahminism, It has had a very negative impact on the Dalit quest for liberation. It further divides the Dalits. Take the case of the Chamars, the most populous caste in north India. Because of the process of what you call Sanskritisation, they are now divided into 62 sub-castes, none of which intermarries with the others. In Uttar Pradesh, the sweepers are divided into several endogamous groups, And, besides this, Sanskritisation really does not result in any change in the attitudes of those who have been practicing untouchability towards them for centuries. Shapes may change, forms may change, but the deep-rooted hatred remains. As I see it, the Hinduisation of the Dalits makes the process of Dalit assertion much more difficult, because the more Hinduised Dalit castes begin to hate their own people who are less Hinduised. Now, if you ask a Valmiki man to marry a Dhanuk or Bansphod woman, he would refuse, because the Dhanuks and Bansphods are much less Hinduised than the Valmikis. Q: What implications does the Hindutva agenda have for the Dalit communities and their struggle for liberation? A: In my opinion, the Hindutva organisations would like to bring the Dalits, who are actually not Hindus, into the Hindu fold and leave them there, at the bottom of the heap. Now, that is also what Gandhi attempted to do. He used to tell the Dalits that God had created them simply to serve the so-called upper castes and that they should carry on with their caste occupations in the hope that in their next life they would be born in a higher caste. That is also what the Hindutva project is all about. So, from the Dalit point of view, the rise of Hindutva is a very dangerous development. If you are really serious about bringing about a fundamental structural change, and not simply cosmetic change, in this caste-ridden society whose roots are in religion, you have to strike at both the caste system as well as the religious ideology that gives it legitimacy. But this the Hindutva organisations cannot and will not do. Q: In an ideal Hindutva set-up, what would be the status of the Dalits? A: In the Hindutva scheme of things, the ideal, so-called 'Golden Age' which they want to drag us back to is the age of the Vedas, the Ramayana, the Gita, the Manusmriti. What was the position of the Dalits and Shudras then? We were treated worse than slaves, and this was given religious sanction by these Brahminical scriptures that the Hindutvawadis champion. So, it may have certainly been a 'Golden Age' for them, but it was beyond doubt the darkest period in history for us Dalits. As I see it, the Hindutva organisations all aim at enforcing the varna system in some form or the other, and this has the most dangerous implications for us. I was recently reading a book by Golwalkar, one-time supremo of the RSS, where he says that the caste system did no harm at all. That glorification of caste may be good from their point of view, but not for us, certainly. To my mind, the rise of Hindutva is actually a product of growing Dalit consciousness, and as the Dalits have now begun struggling for their rights the Brahminical establishment, represented by Hindutva groups, are seeking to scuttle the Dalit liberation quest by diverting the Dalits to fight with other groups like the Muslims and the Christians. Q: What do you think is the role of religion in the broader Dalit struggle? A: I personally feel that there are three institutions that are necessary for the proper functioning of a society. Firstly, the institution of marriage. Secondly, the institution of government. And thirdly, the institution of religion which gives people a moral code to live by and binds them together. This question agitated the mind of Dr .Ambedkar when he was considering severing his ties with Hinduism, with which the Dalits have only very nominally been attached historically. So, he gave us a new interpretation of Buddhism which resembles in many respects the liberation theology of the South American Catholics. The starting point in his religious quest was: What is the role of religion in society? He stressed that religion is a good nurse but can be a bad mistress, because the institution of religion has historically played both a constructive as well as a very destructive role. Q: But many Mahayanist and Theravadin Buddhists claim that Ambedkar's interpretation of Buddhism is not in accordance with fundamental Buddhist teachings. A: It is true that Dr .Ambedkar's interpretation of the Buddhist dhamma differs in several important respects from both the Mahayana and the Theravada, but then right from the early Buddhist period, from soon after the death of the Buddha, Buddhism has been characterized by a tremendous internal diversity. In Japan, for instance, there are some 1260 different Buddhist sects. Q: What do you feel about the emergence of what is called Dalit Christian theology ? A: Dalit Christian theology emerged in the last one decade, primarily as a response to the growing assertion of the Dalits. My own personal feeling is that it is being used as a means of self-defence by Dalits within the Church to challenge the `upper' caste hegemony in the Church structures and hierarchies. I don't see Dalit Christian theology as having had any noticeable impact on the non-Christian Dalits, however. In fact, many among the latter are quite suspicious of the aims of the Church now that it has suddenly begun to present itself as the champion of the Dalits. I feel that the Church authorities are now greatly alarmed as the number of Christians is going down, as several Dalit Christians are leaving the Church to avail of reservation benefits, which, according to the law, are not available to Christian Dalits. So, maybe Dalit Christian theology is also a means to stem that tide. Q: So, would you say that the trend among the Dalits today is towards conversion to Buddhism rather than to Christianity? A: Yes, at least that is how I see it. Buddhism gives them a sense of pride and identity and connects them to a glorious chapter in their own history. But the Buddhist conversion movement is not proceeding as rapidly as we would have liked it to. One reason is that very little attention has been paid to the proper training of bhikkhus [Buddhist monks], although this is something that Ambedkar seriously urged. He said that we should have regular seminaries for training monks, just as the early Buddhists had, in the form of universities such as at Nalanda and Taxila. To begin with, we tried sending our monks to Thailand for training, but many of them went off to the West after completing their course, instead of coming back to India to serve here. So, this is a great problem for us. But we are now planning to set up a seminary for training bhikkhus in the Terai region in Uttar Pradesh, where they will be taught the Buddhist scriptures, the philosophy of Ambedkarism as well as comparative religions. Q: What has been the impact of the conversion to Buddhism on the Mahars of Maharashtra, the community to which Ambedkar belonged? A: As I see it, their conversion has been largely limited to a change of rituals, and has not really made much of a difference in their social status. But because of their conversion many of them have given up drinking alcohol and worshipping Hindu gods like Rama and Krishna. In Maharashtra today, Buddhists are synonymous largely with Mahars, and so the attitudes of others towards them has not really changed, but at least conversion has given them a new sense of identity and self-respect. Q: In your opinion, can conversion to Buddhism help the process of undermining the structures of caste? A: That is what is happening today, although gradually. For instance, the Ambedkar Mission Society, with which I am associated, and whose members are all Buddhists, insists that at least one person in the family of all our members must marry outside his or her own caste. This is the only way to destroy the caste system. If Dalits from different castes begin to convert to Buddhism and start inter-marrying, the internal divisions that have historically worked to weaken the Dalits will gradually begin to disappear. Conversion to Buddhism, in my view, will help consolidate the Dalits into one community, giving them a sense of pride and a positive identity. If they do not convert, they will remain divided into several hundred caste groups and will not be able to assert themselves at all. ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> Help save the life of a child. Support St. Jude Children's Research Hospital's 'Thanks & Giving.' http://us.click.yahoo.com/mGEjbB/5WnJAA/E2hLAA/1dTolB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> 互户互户互户互户互户互せカせЙせ This is ZESTCaste whose members watch India's painful journey to society's de-casteisation. 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