Kuffir (Text of his speech at the discussion, Debating Reservation: Rationalities and Social Justice, at the English and Foreign Languages University on 3rd September; a slightly modified talk was delivered on 4th September at the University of Hyderabad) At UoH Let’s consider the title of this debate: Debating Reservation: Rationalities and Social Justice. Whose perspective …
Do ‘The Hindu’ newspaper’s Photo Captions have Caste too?
Anoop Kumar (This article was first published on 27th July, 2009, on Insight blog) Today, while reading one of our national English dailies, The Hindu, I came across a news item regarding the rekindling of the Gujjar agitation in Rajasthan, demanding Scheduled Tribe status. They are holding a three day caste-panchayat to support their …
Behind the Hardik Patel episode: Conspiracy to end reservations
Fakru Ahmed Bashu While there is uproar from backward classes and downtrodden strata of the society to strictly implement the constitutionally earmarked reservations, there is, on the other hand, a vicious attempt through some recent events to bring the reservation system to an end. Upper caste people with vested interests, who came out openly …
‘Excellence’ through Expulsion: A case of Arbitrary Merit vs Constitutional Mandate
(Preliminary) Fact Finding Report on Expulsion of SC/ST/OBC students from IIT, Roorkee 30th July 2015 – 1st August 2015 ~ National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights National Dalit Movement for Justice ~ Fact Finding Team: Anoop Kumar, Dilip C. Mandal, Gurinder Azad, Nidhin Shobhana and Shefali Saini Report Authored by: Nidhin Shobhana and Shefali …
Dalit-Bahujan Students Meet in the UK
Harshada Vinaya With an intention to build a constructive dialogue and build a support network amongst the Dalit Bahujan students in the UK, a meeting was organised on the 20th of July 2015 in London. The objective of this meeting was primarily to form a network of the Dalit Bahujan students in the UK …
Caste Diversity in Indian Development Sector: Does it Exist?
Karthik Navayan Gramsci uses the analogy of civil society as a system of trenches and redoubts surrounding the state1. All political attempts by the underprivileged classes–castes in Indian context–to overcome the barriers are drowned by the development sector that claims for itself the status of the civil society. Does the civil society, popularly understood …
Fight against Brahmanical ‘Food Untouchability’
EFLU Students (Satish Kumar, Diksha, Kanagaraj and Bhupati) Bans and appropriation have been prominent strategies of brahmanical forces to maintain caste hierarchy for thousands of years. They have sustained their hegemony by positing resistance cultures as illegitimate or immoral. This culture of banning is evident through the denial of access to Vedas for the Shudras …
The Unclean Politics behind Swachh Bharat
Ravi Chandran The Swachh Bharat (Clean India) campaign has raised a few critiques questioning the credibility of the campaign. Most of the debates are responses to the pictures where Mr. Narendra Modi is shown holding a broom and posing for pictures. This article is a small response to the proposed programme. Brief Outline The …
Great coaching opportunity for SC/ST students from AIM-IMS
Ambedkar International Mission (AIM) has started a new initiative that shall benefit students from Dalit, Adivasi, OBC and other under-represented communities aspiring to enter premier higher educational institutions in the country. As part of this initiative IMS Learning Resources Pvt Ltd (or IMS), which is one of the best coaching institutions in the country, shall offer coaching for these students …