Moradabad : Chairman of National Commission for Scheduled Castes Buta Singh today assured justice to the mother of two dalit sisters, who were allegedly burnt to death by a mob here.Singh visited Kothiwal Nagar area and met the victims'' mother Rajo and assured her of justice, officials said.

Panipat: In Haryana, a shocking incident of a series of gangrapes with a 13-year-old Dalit minor by different set of people has come to light. The victim, a class 6 student and a resident of Budakheda village of Jind, was gang-raped in a single day by nine different people. The ordeal of the girl was not over there, as she was subsequently confined in a house in Panipat and gang-raped for nine days. The police has now rescued the girl from Panipat. 

Read more...

The National Commission for Scheduled Castes will be organizing awareness camps in all divisions/mandals of all States/UTs in order to disseminate the information about their rights and safeguards provided in the Constitution of India. The Commission during its interaction with various organizations has observed that the majority of Scheduled Caste people are not aware of their rights and they need to be informed extensively about it.

As per NFHS-3, undernutrition is 42.5 % in children below five years. It is 47.9% in Scheduled castes, 54.5% in scheduled tribes and 42.3% in other backward classes. In rural areas it is 45.6 % as compared to 32.7 % in urban areas. 35.6 % of women suffer from Chronic Energy Deficiency (CED). The prevalence of CED in rural areas is 40.6% compared to 25 % in urban areas. It is 41.1% in Scheduled castes, 46.6% in scheduled tribes and 35.7 % in other backward classes.

Read more...

Some cases of appointments made on the basis of allegedly fake caste certificates have come to the notice of Government. As per information received from 30 Ministries/ Departments, there were about 1383 cases of appointments made on the basis of allegedly false/ fake caste certificates. The Central Bureau of Investigation has registered 58 cases against 67 persons on allegations of appointment on the basis of fake caste certificates.

Jason Keith Fernandes

Introduction

Sharing his experiences on Christian-Muslim dialogue in the March '09 issue of Jivan, Fr Paul Jackson was unusually reticent on the challenges that face the Catholic aspirant on this route. To say that this route is a path of thorns would not be an exaggeration, since there are quite a few voices expressing frustration with the lack of response to this aspect of our dialogical calling.

The roots of the troubling dryness of inter-faith dialogue within the Catholic Church in India, and the failure to effectively initiate a meaningful dialogue with the Muslims in India, lie in one basic ailment, in my opinion: the failure to develop a rigorous caste-based critique both of ourselves, the stand of the Church, as well as that of Indian nationalism, to which the Catholic Church has unwittingly become a handmaiden.

The Christian memory of Caste

A curious feature of many Indian Christians' narratives of their journey in inter-faith dialogue is that these inexplicably begin with an acknowledgement of their Hindu ancestry. What is interesting, but not surprising, however, is that most of these narratives also revel and glory in their 'former' upper caste identity. This recollection of the route of their conversion to the Christian faith very often allows the speaker to make a crucial distinction between themselves and other Christians.

Read more...

Percentage of Scheduled Caste population to total population as per 2001 Census, in India, and in States/Union Territories, is mentioned in the table below:

 Percentage of Scheduled Caste (SC) population to total population in India and States/Union Territories, as per 2001 Census

Read more...