Trigger warning: casteism, death by suicide
Dalit is a term used to describe a level of poverty in India. The caste system is based on one’s ancestry, not on one’s actual occupation. Dalits are forced to live on the outskirts of society.
This means that most Dalits are forced to work very hard to support their families, while they are still in school and college. Many work as labourers or take up other blue-collar jobs.
Today, 70 years after independence, Dalits continue to bear the brunt of violence and discrimination. This was highlighted in the recent past by the tragic death (by suicide) of Rohith Vemula, a PhD student at the University of Hyderabad.
Rohith hung himself, blaming his birth as a “fatal accident” in a chilling final note. We could not be further away from what the constitution envisioned—a free and fair India.
The death by suicide of Dr Payal Tadvi, a doctor and student at Mumbai’s TN Topivala National Medical College, also spotlighted the issue of caste discrimination in college campuses. She was an Adivasi and Muslim woman from the Tadvi Bhil community of Maharashtra.
Dalits And Education In India
Dalit students face discriminatory attitudes from fellow students and the educational community as a whole, in particular from upper caste members who look at education for Dalits as a threat to caste hierarchies and power relations.
Intolerance and prejudice towards Dalits is prevalent in institutions of higher education, where discrimination is practiced by upper caste seniors and students, teachers as well as administrative staff.
The caste bias manifests itself in the way teachers ignore Dalit students and unjustly fail them in exams; in social exclusion and physical abuse; and in the unwillingness of the university administration to assist Dalits and support them.
As a grave consequence of this harassment, a disproportionate number of Dalit and Adivasi students have died by suicide in India. Many drop out of school and college for the same reason.
The huge dropout rate found in SC-ST groups is due to many factors, the most important one being the discriminatory practices based on their socio-economic background.
My Experiences As A Dalit
I was alone as I didn’t know too many others like me at the University of North Bengal (NBU). I was never comfortable talking about who I was because of the same reason. Many of my batchmates thought that Dalit students are not good enough.
I have been working with the Bandhu Foundation since 2021. While working there, I saw that many Dalit students didn’t get to finish their education. This is because they are deprived of property and wealth, because of the lack of economic opportunities faced by them and their families.
Low paying jobs like manual or agricultural labour, are not sufficient to support an entire family. Their parents are forced to do menial jobs, and as a result, their children are deprived of the education they deserve.
What we need to understand is that to end the harassment of Dalit people, it is crucial that we focus on the primary and basic rights of the Dalit population first. We need to enable educational and economic progress so that Dalits can envision a just future for themselves, and the generations to come.
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This is the first part of the three-part series on ‘casteism in educational spaces’ as a part of the Justicemakers’ Writer’s Training Program, run in partnership with Agami and Ashoka’s Law For All Initiative. You can find the second and third part here and here.