Publication:Times of India Mumbai; Date:Sep 24, 2006; Section:Review; Page Number:15
http://epaper.timesofindia.com/Repository/ml.asp?Ref=VE9JTS8yMDA2LzA5LzI0I0FyMDE1MDA=&Mode=HTML&Locale=english-skin-custom BAD LANGUAGE When dalits hear voices Quota students are routinely abused in elite colleges. They are called sheddus, slang for scheduled caste, charged with corruption and even beaten up, report Sharmila Ganesan and Nilanjana Sengupta When Dilip Mhaske was 10, he thought everyone was equal. Until one Saturday, when his grandmother asked him to pour oil on the Hanuman idol in the nearby temple. For committing that taboo, his father, a landless dalit farmer, had to feed all the upper-caste villagers and even pay them as penance. Mhaske cried. Today, he has completed his MPhil in land reforms from IIT Powai. Now in his village, no one refuses him water. He can even touch God. But, on the campus of the premier college, his surname haunts him. He is among the many who face the humiliation every day of merit list students calling them chamar or meenagiri, references to menial tasks that their forefathers, and even fathers did. They feel powerless to protest against these insults. After all, they are accustomed to discrimination. Hall managers in the campus sneer at them as they pay their fees because they get concessions in accommodation and canteen food. "When I first entered the hostel, the hall manager asked me in front of everyone there, - Why is the amount lower for you?" says PhD student Nilratan Shende, who is researching starvation deaths and food security at IIT Powai. Quota students have to think twice before taking food from the canteen for their visitors because they face taunts like, "Taking excess food for the villagers?" They are also scared to ask questions in English. When Nilratan Shende stood for the treasurer's position in a college in Mumbai, voters asked him, "Can you count from one to 10?" When a dalit student stood for the post of mess secretary in the Hyderabad university hostel, some years ago, students denounced him saying, "He is a dalit, he will eat money." Unable to excel in top institutes because of their discomfort with English and poverty-induced lack of confidence, they isolate themselves in the corners and watch the mainstream go by. When they perform well, they are mistaken for brahmins. "When I did well consistently in my BA and post-graduation course in anthropology in Pune, I had a hard time convincing my friend that I belonged to the Agri community," says Sai Thakur, now a PhD student at the Humanities department in IITB. The government's recent decision to further reservation in colleges has aggravated matters. Disgusted at the idea of quotas based on caste, in IIT Kanpur, 200 students dropped their surnames and adopted "Bharat" as their common surname. Across the country, students are divided by their opinions on reservation. They just don't get along. In many places, general category students call them sheddus. No matter how hard they try, there's no escaping their identity. The merit list displayed on the notice board announces it. This rank is their introduction to upper-caste seniors, during friendly ragging sessions, which could later become an outlet for the frustration of general category students. Like the final-year AIIMS (All India Institute of Medical Sciences) student, who made a reserved category fresher sit on the ground while a brahmin fresher sat on a chair, next to him. The senior asked him to say, "I am from a lower caste," repeatedly, to show him his place in the premises, where he had gained an "easy" entry this year. Hostels then become ghettoes. In AIIMS, quota students chiefly occupy the top two floors of the hostel. An engraved message on the door of one quota student on another floor asked him to "get out of this wing". Final-year student Ajay Kumar Singh still recalls the day he shifted from room number 43, which had leakage problems, to number 45. The whole wing was otherwise occupied by general category students, who promptly put up a board on top of the common carrom board, "Everyone except occupant of room number 45 can play." A reserved category student, who managed to become the gym secretary of AIIMS, resigned from his post as the financial secretary (a general category student) refused to release him funds. "He was chased around and beaten up by the executive heads of the student council," says Sunil Chumber, sub-dean of AIIMS. It is believed that several professors are on the side of the anti-reservation batallion. That's why during the recent agitation, some pro-reservation students hid their faces behind their placards, so that their professors wouldn't spot them. Once their pro-reservation rally was even mistaken by newspapers as an anti-reservation demonstration. Dalit students survive through a hard skin formed after a whole life replete with insults. Some have heard upper-caste neighbours call the Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar airport at Nagpur, "the scheduled caste airport". Some have lived in colonies where upper-caste boys wouldn't lend them their cricket bats. At the same time, it is not difficult to understand what provokes general category students to behave the way they do. One such student in a Mumbai management institute says that he feels he is the one in the minority with all the different quota systems in place. "There are very few of us who speak English and are from city colleges," he says. Yet, when freshers joined the institute in August this year, these general category students gathered the courage to rag a few quota students. "We surrounded them and asked, how could they with such less marks, even think of joining an MBA institute," he says, a bit sheepishly. All in the name In July this year, 200 students of IIT Kanpur decided to protest against reservations by substituting their last names with "Bharat". They included forward caste, dalit and quota students. To diminish the negative implications of their caste-specific names, some people have been trying to mask their identities for years now. In Andhra Pradesh, most dalits convert to Christianity. They have two entirely different names - a Christian name for the church, and a Hindu name for claiming quotas. For instance, the same man may be called Benjamin Isaac and Krishna Raju. Nanhey, a scheduled tribe meaning "small", is often modified to "Nene". In West Bengal, the Chandalas, meaning untouchables, have changed their name to Namasudra, which means "better name". The most common surnames that dalits adopt to escape the issue of untouchability are Bharti, Singh and Chaudhry. Next in line are Das, Verma and Kumar. Some opt for Prasad and Lal. The sweeper community, known as Chuda in the north, Jamadar in UP, Mehtar, Dumar and Hela in Madhya Pradesh, are now collectively known as the Valmiki or Balmiki community. The original names are considered derogatory. Dalit leaders often suffix Ambedkar, Gautam or Buddha to their first names, like BJP leader Sanghapriya Gautam. Villages do not allow people belonging to the backward classes to keep names of Hindu gods. Earlier they would assume non-descriptive names like Kachra (rubbish), Dhagdu (stone), Ghela (mad) or Laluah (simpleton). Now they like to keep names of Bollywood heroes like Rohit, Rahul and Krish. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ greenyouth mailinglist is the activist support mailinglist for kerala run by Global Alternate Information Applications (GAIA) To post to this group, send email to [email protected] -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
