Frontline
June 1999
Document

Broken People

Violence against ‘Untouchables’ growing, says human rights’ report, while the Indian Government fails to prevent massacres, rapes, and exploitation 

The Indian government has  failed to prevent widespread  violence and discrimination against more than 160 mil
 lion people at the bottom of the Hindu caste system, Human Rights Watch, a US–based human rights group has charged in a recent report Broken People: Caste Violence Against India’s “ Untouchables”, released recently.
The 291–page extensive report on the plight of India’s Dalits calls on the Indian government to disband private militias and implement national legislation to prevent and prosecute caste–based attacks. 

Excerpts:
“’Untouchability’ was abolished under India’s constitution in 1950. Yet, entire villages in many Indian states remain completely segregated by caste, in a system of “hidden apartheid”. Untouchables, or Dalits — the name literally means “broken” people — may not enter the higher–caste sections of villages, may not use the same wells, wear shoes in the presence of upper castes, visit the same temples, drink from the same cups in tea stalls, or lay claim to land that is legally theirs. Dalit children are frequently made to sit in the back of classrooms. Dalit villagers have been the victims of many brutal massacres in recent years. 

‘Untouchability’ is not an ancient cultural artifact, it is human rights abuse on a vast scale. The tools for change are in place, what is lacking is the political will for their implementation… Since the early 1990s, violence against Dalits has escalated dramatically in response to the growing Dalit rights movements.

Upper–caste employers frequently use caste as a cover for exploitative economic arrangements. With the exception of a minority who have benefited from India’s policy of reservations (affirmative action), Dalits are relegated to the most menial tasks.

An estimated forty million people in India, among them fifteen million children, are bonded laborers, working in slave–like conditions in order to pay off debts. The majority of them are Dalits. At least one million Dalits work as manual scavengers, clearing feces from latrines and disposing of dead animals with their bare hands. 

Dalits also comprise the majority of agricultural laborers who work for a few kilograms of rice, or 15–35 rupees (less than US$ 1) a day. In India’s southern states, thousands of Dalit girls are forced to become prostitutes for upper–caste patrons and village priests before reaching the age of puberty. Landlords and the police use sexual abuse and other forms of violence against women to inflict political “lessons” and crush dissent within the community. Dalit women have been arrested and tortured in custody to punish their male relatives who are hiding from the authorities.’ 

The report documents violence in the eastern state of Bihar and the southern state of Tamil Nadu. In Bihar, high–caste landlords have organized private militias, or senas, which have killed Dalit villagers with impunity. Extremist guerrilla groups have retaliated by killing high–caste villagers, leading to an escalating cycle of violence. Such attacks on civilians constitute violations of international humanitarian law... 

One of the most prominent militias, the Ranvir Sena, has been responsible for the massacre of more than 400 Dalit villagers in Bihar between 1995 and 1999. Within a span of three weeks in January and February 1999, sena members killed 34 Dalit villagers in two separate attacks. On March 19, 1999, members of the Maoist Communist Centre, a guerrilla organization with low–caste supporters, beheaded 33 upper–caste villagers in retaliation for the sena killings. Both sides have threatened more ‘revenge killings’ in the weeks to come. 

The senas, which claim many politicians as members, operate with impunity. In some cases, police have accompanied them during their attacks and have stood by as they killed villagers in their homes. In other cases, police raids have followed attacks by the senas. The purpose of the raids is often to terrorize Dalits as a group, whether or not they are members of guerilla organizations. During the raids, the police have routinely beaten villagers, sexually assaulted women, and destroyed property. Sena leaders and police officials have never been prosecuted for such killings and abuses. 

Dalits throughout the country also suffer from de facto disenfranchisement. During elections, Dalits are routinely threatened and beaten by political party strongmen in order to compel them to vote for certain candidates. Dalits who run for political office in village councils and municipalities (through seats that have been constitutionally “reserved” for them) have been threatened with physical abuse and even death to get them to withdraw from the campaign.” 

Human Rights Watch has called for independent investigations into the killings and for the disarming of the militias. 

“In the village of Melavalavu, Tamil Nadu, following the election of a Dalit to the village council presidency, members of a higher–caste group murdered six Dalits in June 1997, including the elected council president, whom they beheaded. As of February 1999, the accused murderers — who had been voted out of their once secure elected positions — had not been prosecuted. 

In cases investigated for this report, with the exception of a few transfers and suspensions, no action has been taken against police officers involved in violent raids or summary executions, or against those accused of colluding with private actors to carry out attacks on Dalits. In many instances, Dalits have repeatedly called for police protection and been ignored. Even national government agencies like the Indian National Commission for Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, the Indian National Human Rights Commission and the National Police Commission concur that impunity is rampant.” 

The report includes more than forty specific recommendations to the Indian government at the central and state level, many of them focused on implementing a 1989 law (Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes — Prevention of Atrocities Act) banning atrocities against Dalits. According to that law, it is illegal to force Dalits into bonded labor, deny them access to public places, foul their drinking water, force them to eat “obnoxious substances,” or “parade them naked or with painted face or body.” 

The recommendations also call for the establishment of special courts and atrocities units to prosecute crimes against Dalits and more women police personnel to register complaints by Dalit women. The report authored by Smita Narula, researcher for the Asia division of Human Rights Watch, formulated all its recommendations in consultation with Indian activists involved in the National Campaign for Dalit Human Rights, founded in 1998. This report is also available online at: http://www.hrw.orgireports/1999/india. The password to access the report is: smita. 


“The Ranvir Sena is an illegal private militia of upper–caste landlords in the eastern state of Bihar. In the last four years, it has been responsible for the massacres of more than 400 Dalit (‘untouchable’) villagers. In one of the largest such massacres, on the night of December 1, 1997, the Ranvir Sena shot dead sixteen children, 
twenty–seven women, and eighteen men in the village of Laxmanpur–Bathe. Under the cover of night, armed Sena activists entered Dalit homes and attacked the victims while they were sleeping. In some families, three generations were killed. Most of the men fled the village when the attack began, so women and children numbered high among the fatalities. Ramchela Paswan returned home from the fields to find the bodies of seven of his family members: ‘I started beating my chest and screaming that no one is left.’ Five teenage girls were also raped and mutilated before being shot in the chest.     

Not one of the militia’s members has been prosecuted for the massacre.”


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