NATIONAL CAMPAIGN ON DALIT HUMAN RIGHTS is an Advocacy Platform committed for Dalit Human Rights at the Grass root, National and International levels. Dalits In News aims at sensitizing Civil societies, HR Mechanisms and providing updates of HR violations on Dalits for their Intervention.
NATIONAL CAMPAIGN ON DALIT HUMAN RIGHTS NCDHR Dalits In News March 11, 2007 Thousands of Hindus vow to end caste divide- Andhra Cafe http://www.andhracafe.com/index.php?m=show <http://www.andhracafe.com/index.php?m=show&id=19970> &id=19970 Scrap the food trap- The Pioneer http://www.dailypioneer.com/columnist1.asp?main_variable=Columnist&file_name=prasad%2Fprasad199.txt&writer=prasad Congressmen, police injured as Gandhinagar rally turns violent- The Hindu <http://www.hindu.com/2007/03/09/stories/2007030910451200.htm> http://www.hindu.com/2007/03/09/stories/2007030910451200.htm Dalits’ concern moves Mann- The Pioneer http://www.indiapress.org/gen/news.php/The_Tribune/400x60/0 Gohana: Sangwan’s son appears in court- The Pioneer http://www.indiapress.org/gen/news.php/The_Tribune/400x60/0 National Convention on bonded labour in Jalandhar- Zee News http://www.zeenews.com/articles.asp?aid=359110 <http://www.zeenews.com/articles.asp?aid=359110&sid=NAT> &sid=NAT Andhra Cafe Thousands of Hindus vow to end caste divide http://www.andhracafe.com/index.php?m=show <http://www.andhracafe.com/index.php?m=show&id=19970> &id=19970 New Delhi, March 10 (IANS) Railway porters in their trademark red uniform, Hindu holy men in saffron robes, social activists, large numbers from the middle class...all joined hands here as spiritual guru Sri Sri Ravi Shankar launched a campaign to end centuries of discrimination against Dalits. Leaders of several social groups from within the Hindu community, the Dalits included, were among the 4,000 who gathered at the open air theatre in Pragati Maidan here Friday evening and took a pledge to end the caste divide that Ravi Shankar warned would harm India's progress in the long run. A seven-point action plan that Ravi Shankar unveiled at the meeting and which the thousands of men and women accepted with their right hands outstretched included an immediate end to the ban on the entry of Dalits into Hindu temples in parts of India. The other aspects of the 'action plan' are ending the practice of keeping separate utensils for the use of Dalits in eateries and also providing religious and spiritual education to Dalit children. 'The anger of the past should not engulf us and divide the country. The fear and communication gap between communities is what is keeping us apart,' he said in a brief address, first in English and then in Hindi. 'We must accept the reality and reconcile the differences. 'What we have started today will resonate across the country and unite the people. When leaders come together and take a vow, the people will follow them,' he added. 'My main concern is how to bring people together.' The organisers pointed out that months of painstaking hard work had gone into the conference, with Ravi Shankar - whose Art of Living Foundation has millions of followers across the world - reaching out to the leaders and activists of a wide variety of social groups in the Hindu fold. Present at the 'Truth and Reconciliation Conference' were representatives of the Bhumihar, Valmiki, Brahmin, Dalit, Gujjar, Vanniar, Kayastha, Kshatriya, Kurmi, Mahar, Majhabi, Marwari, Meena, Mushar, Paswan, Raigar, Rajput, Thakur, Thevar, Pasi, Mala, Vaish, Valmiki, Verma and Yadav communities. Ravi Shankar pointed out that many were unaware that Dalits had contributed immensely in the development of Hindu scriptures. 'Historically, many of the revered rishis were Dalits. The authors of the Ramayana and Mahabharata, Maharishis Valmiki and Vyas respectively, were Dalits. The narrator of the Puranas, Soot Maharishi, was a Dalit...We need to make the people realise that discrimination is not sanctioned by religion.' Despite legislation making discrimination against Dalits a crime, the offence continues in large parts of India. Many young Dalits have today joined the ranks of Maoists in sheer disgust, convinced that mainstream India does not care for them. Speaker after speaker at the conference praised Ravi Shankar for his initiative and promised to spread the 'action plan' in their areas of influence. But Udit Raj, a civil servant-turned-social activist, cautioned that it would need more than a public pledge to end caste discrimination. 'The fact is that the Dalit community to which I belong has no representation in the capital market, in the share market. There is hardly any Dalit among the leading journalists in this country. Can I forget all that?' he said, describing the state of a community that for centuries was considered 'untouchable' by high caste Hindus and made to do demeaning work. 'The wound goes very deep,' Udit Raj said. 'The media calls me a Dalit leader. Why? Do they call Atal Bihari Vajpayee a Brahmin leader? Do they call L.K. Advani a Sindhi leader? 'India cannot be a superpower unless caste discrimination does not end. I see so many (middle class) volunteers from the so-called upper castes here. But will they attend my rallies too? They won't.' He quickly added: 'But this is the beginning.' The Pioneer Scrap the food trap http://www.dailypioneer.com/columnist1.asp?main_variable=Columnist&file_name=prasad%2Fprasad199.txt&writer=prasad Chandrabhan Prasad Honourable Finance Minister, Sir, You have allocated Rs 7,324 crore on Mid-Day-Meal (MDM) scheme in this budget. But allocated only Rs 611 crore on the Post Matric Scholarship - India's most successful and transparent public policy program for Dalits/Adivasis. While defending MDM, Ministry of Human Resource Development (HRD) offers the following rational: "The programme is intended to give a boost to universalisation of primary education, by increasing enrolment, retention and attendance and simultaneously impacting on nutrition of students in primary classes." In your opinion, thus, food will attract children of the poor to schools. Consider the following: In the year 1989-99, there were 2.22 crore Dalits and 1.09 crore Adivasi children in the school going age group of 6-11 years. Of them, 1.95 crore Dalits, and 93 lakh Adivasi children were already in schools. (Selected Educational Statistics, 1998-99, New Delhi, 2000). These figures relate to pre-MDM scheme days. Finance Minister, how do you explain the near universal enrolment of Dalit/Adivasi children at primary level when MDM scheme wasn't in existence? The figures only prove that: first, that Dalit/Adivasi parents value education, second that, they are serious about future of their children, and third that, they send their children to school for education, and not for food. Retention in schools is cited one of the reasons for MDM. Consider the following: In 1989-99, 98.81 lakh Dalits and 49 lakh Adivasi children were in school going age group of 11-14 years (VI-VIII) Of them, 61.35 lakh, Dalits and 25.56 lakh Adivasi children were enrolled in middle schools (VI-VIII). This figure, Finance Minister, exposes your retention in school logic - as the dropout rate is more in the middle level whereas your MDM is meant for primary schools. The Ministry of HRD in its mission statement is 'encouraging poor children, belonging to disadvantaged sections, to attend school more regularly and help them concentrate on classroom activities' through food incentives. Seems a bit strange. Coming to the nutrition, have you bothered to check what kind of food is being served in these schools. Even in the Capital, children have been known to fall sick after eating the food - think of remote areas. Coming back to enhancing enrolment and retention questions, your own report - Selected Educational Statistics, contradicts you. As per the report, the drop-out rate at primary level (I-V) is at 42.39 per cent, but it goes up to 56.82 per cent at the middle school level (VI-VIII). Finance Minister, have you ever thought as why the drop-out rate is higher at middle level? Here are some reasons: In the villages, poor don't get work for more than six months in a calendar year. Harvesting and sowing are peak seasons when all members of the family must work to sustain them for the other six months Children in the age group of 6-11 years are unemployable, but once they are 11-years-old they become employable. In the villages sowing and harvesting seasons clash with academic calendar - paddy is planted in July when schools open. Paddy harvesting and wheat sowing take place in November-December when the half-yearly exams take place. Wheat is harvested/maize are harvested in March/April when final exams take place. This interferes with their education. It for this very reason that we want to compensate the parents by Rs three per child per day and rest assured the children won't miss a day's school. The cost of this would be less than Rs 5,000 crore a year. But instead you will spend Rs 7,324 crore on MDM which nobody asked for. Finance Minister, do you know that MDM scheme has paralysed teaching primary schools, and radically altered tastes of the children. Before the MDM scheme, children used to go to school for education. Now, they go to schools for food. The Hindu Congressmen, police injured as Gandhinagar rally turns violent <http://www.hindu.com/2007/03/09/stories/2007030910451200.htm> http://www.hindu.com/2007/03/09/stories/2007030910451200.htm Special Correspondent GANDHINAGAR: The police resorted to lathicharge and lobbed teargas shells after a Dalit rally organised by the Congress turned violent and its participants started throwing stones on them here on Thursday. The participants were irked at bring prevented from marching to the Assembly building. At least 30 persons, including six policemen, were injured. More than 100 Congress leaders and workers, including B.K. Hariprasad, All-India Congress Committee general secretary who is in charge of Gujarat affairs; AICC joint secretary and former Union Minister Mukul Wasnik; State president Bharat Solanki, and leader of the Opposition in the Assembly Arjun Modhvadia, were detained. They were later released. The Congress leaders blamed the police for the violence and threatened to take the fight to the streets all over the State. Mr. Solanki said the police had "clear instructions" from the Narendra Modi Government to "use force" to disrupt the rally "at all costs." He claimed that the police first threw stones on the rally participants and later used water cannon, teargas shells and resorted to " the unprovoked lathicharge" to prevent them from demonstrating in front of the Assembly. The police "misbehaved" with women workers on International Women's Day, he alleged. Congress workers in every district and taluk headquarters would organise morchas protesting against the "police brutality." Walkout in Assembly The lathicharge episode had its echo in the Assembly, where the entire Opposition walked out in protest against the Government's alleged refusal to take note of the incident. It demanded that Minister of State for Home Amit Shah make a statement on the incident. Earlier, Speaker Mangaldas Patel referred to the Privileges Committee a motion moved by Parliamentary Affairs Minister Ashok Bhatt alleging that some "leaflets" on the rally were distributed to Congress members inside the House. The Congress members protested, claiming that the leaflets were not distributed and were only "brought in." The Pioneer Dalits’ concern moves Mann http://www.indiapress.org/gen/news.php/The_Tribune/400x60/0 Karnal, March 10 President of Shiromani Akali Dal (A) Simranjit Singh Mann has expressed concern over the plight of Dalits in Haryana and Punjab. Talking to The Tribune on Thursday Mann said Dalits belonging to different religions in these two states were made an easy target of hatred by the upper castes. He had visited Saalwan village in Karnal on Wednesday where certain miscreants had ransacked a Dalit basti on March 1. He emphasised the need to re-investigate the case of death of Sonu, a Dalit youth whose body was found from the village under suspicious circumstances. He demanded that the family of the deceased should be given suitable compensation and government job should be granted to one member of the family. — TNS The Pioneer Gohana: Sangwan’s son appears in court http://www.indiapress.org/gen/news.php/The_Tribune/400x60/0 Our Correspondent Ambala, March 10 Pradeep Sangwan, son of BJP MP Kishan Singh Sangwan, appeared in the CBI court along with 12 other accused in the Gohana case here today. Ajay Jain, the counsel for Sangwan, said the court fixed April 25 as the next date of hearing. The CBI had filed a charge sheet against the 13 for setting ablaze a colony of Dalits in Gohana. Zee News National Convention on bonded labour in Jalandhar http://www.zeenews.com/articles.asp?aid=359110 <http://www.zeenews.com/articles.asp?aid=359110&sid=NAT> &sid=NAT Jalandhar, Mar 10: A national convention to discuss strategies to tackle bonded labour will start here today. Four social organisations - Centre for Education and Communication, Dalit Dasta Virodhi Andolan (DDVA), Jata Vimukti Karnataka and Jan Jagriti Kendra will come together to organise the two-day event. "More than 500 delegates from Delhi, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, Punjab, Bihar, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh will be participating in the conference," Jai Singh, president DDVA told reporters. About 5,000 people representing the most vulnerable classes of the society would also participate, he said. "This programme has been called in the context of the reality that though bonded labour stands legally abolished by the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act 1976, it still persists in a wide range of sectors drawing substance from the oppressive caste system, social orthodoxy, illiteracy and the economic backwardness of the people," Singh said. The aim of the convention is to highlight the plight of bonded labourers and seek recommitment on the issue from various stakeholders, he said. There should be a survey to identify child labourers and bonded labourers in the country and labour laws should also be implemented to them, J John, CEC executive director said. The inaugural function of the convention would be chaired by veteran socialist leader Surinder Mohan. Other social activists such as swami Agnivesh and MP Ramdas Atwale will also attend. Bureau Report ARUN KHOTE National Media Secretary NATIONAL CAMPAIGN ON DALIT HUMAN RIGHTS (NCDHR) Add: 8/1, South Patel Nagar, NEW DELHI- 110008 ( INDIA) Mobile : 91# 9350183802 Ph & Fax- 91#11-25842249, 91#11-25842250 E Mail : [EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Website : www.dalits.org www.ncdhr.org
