M. Swathy Margaret

(First Published in Insight Youth Voices magazine in 2005)

I am a Dalit-middle-class, University educated, Telugu speaking Dalit-Christian-Woman. All these identities have a role in the way I perceive myself and the worlds I inhabit. I, as a Dalit woman, primarily write for Dalit women to uphold our interests. This statement of mine is necessary because if we do not define ourselves for ourselves, we will be defined by others – for their use and to our detriment. This voice is not representative of all Dalit women. However, I know that my voice is important because it is the voice of a socially denigrated category, suppressed and silenced.

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Gurinder Singh Azad

[Gurinder Singh Azad, of the Dalit & Adivasi Students' Portal, was involved in the Death of Merit campaign against caste discrimination and suicides of Dalit, Adivasi students in India's premier educational institutions. The tragic death of Anil Kumar Meena, a tribal student from a marginalized background, in AIIMS brings back memories of the suspicious death, which was never fully investigated, of Dr Balmukund Bharti two years ago, also at AIIMS. Balmukund's death (please watch the testimonies of Dr Bharti's family on the circumstances, engineered in AIIMS, that brought about his death) had come three years after the Thorat Committee, appointed expressly to look into caste discimination in AIIMS had submitted its report. If the powers that be had bothered to seriously look into what the report said and worked on its recommendations Dr Bharti's death could have been avoided (please read what the Death of Merit campaign had discovered about 'Who killed Dr Balmukund Bharti in AIIMS?') and so could Anil Kumar Meena's death, perhaps.

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Rahul Bhalerao

Continued from here.

To the question 'what do Karma and Guna exactly mean according to Gita?' a generic and philosophical meaning is proffered as the answer. According to this response, Karma is any act or deed, be it good or bad, which in turn produces good Karma or bad Karma respectively. But, irrespective of the best philosophical arguments one makes, based on one's own convenient interpretations, the subject dealt with in the Gita remains independent of those interpretations.

Yes, Gita does talk at length about good Karma, bad Karma, past Karma etc.; but it certainly does not use the term 'Karma' in a generic form throughout. This is why I said that defenders do not give a holistic picture while justifying Gita. Let us see what Gita says immediately after its declaration on the forming of the four-fold Varna system in verse 4.13:

From 4.14 onwards, Krishna goes on to explain what he means by Karma:

Chapter 4, Verse 15:

"Evam jnaatwaa kritam karma poorvair api mumukshubhih|

Kuru karmaiva tasmaat twam poorvaih poorvataram kritam||"

"Having known this, the ancient seekers after freedom also performed actions; therefore, do thou perform actions as did the ancients in days of yore."

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Rahul Bhalerao

Continued from here.

Coming back to the justifications given by the supporters of Gita, one finds that they are merely based on a few ambiguous individual verses scattered around the Gita. They certainly lack the holistic understanding and message that Gita preaches; let alone the interpretations that have evolved in practice since the period of Gita. More significantly, what these theoretical interpretations display is the ignorance of the nature of the Caste system in everyday practice that has existed for thousands of years. While one can make a hundred attempts at justifying that Caste as per the Gita is based on Karma alone and it is only meant for the good of society, but it would be a grave mistake to ignore the practical nature of Caste, which is based solely on birth for thousands of years, along with fixity of professions, disallowing of inter-dining and inter-marriages. Caste has not produced any good results for a large majority of the Indian society. It would be foolish to think that the wrong interpretations of a supposedly great text were only opportunistic and coincidental. To take a holistic look at what Gita really preaches, and what justifications its proponents give to its glorification of violence and caste, let us start by asking a few questions:

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Rahul Bhalerao

Recent controversies, both local and international, have sparked a series of discussions and debates in media and social networks about the Hindu holy book Bhagvad Gita. When the Karnataka Education minister decided to saffronize the education system by proposing Gita teachings to be made compulsory, the left, liberal and secular voices attacked the BJP for mixing secular education with religious propaganda. On the other hand, when Russia decided to ban the holy book on the premise of its justifications for violence, the saffron parties found support in the same left, liberal and secular voices pitching against the Russian controversy, making it a national issue in the Parliament over cultural pride. So how is it that the book that is entitled to one faith is also accepted as the core of cultural values of the entire nation? How is it that Hinduism, which can hardly be considered as one faith, a homage to hundreds of contradicting spiritual theories, a collection of traditions and rituals that are so exclusively different for each community, caste and region, with a bunch of religious texts including Vedas, Shastras, Puranas, Smritis, each one declaring themselves undisputable, unquestionable and still exhibiting contradictions both within and among themselves, has revered Bhagvad Gita which is only one section of the epic Mahabharata which had a singular purpose of justifying war, to be the one book that is the essence of the entire religion? And more than the one religion, why is it now being showcased as the essence of the entire Indian culture?

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Desecration of Ambedkar statues: Truth is the first casualty (Part II)

Continued from here. 

In this concluding part on the issue of desecration of Dr Ambedkar's statues in Andhra Pradesh, G Jhansi, of Dalit Sthree Sakthi,  maps for us the morphing forms of atrocities on dalit assertions. In her analytical narrative of the complex caste politics that sustains such horrendous acts, she brings to us the powerful message of 'We'll do a Chunduru now', the message of the Dalits who waged long, heroic battles against the perpetrators of organized killing and violence in places like Chunduru, Karamchedu, Pippara, Padirikuppam in the eighties and nineties, for justice. Symbolizing the Dalits' resolve, tenacity and conviction in the Ambedkarite path of confronting caste oppression.

~~~

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