Christian council condemns anti Dalit remarks, calls for national sensitivity on Dalit and Tribal identity and self-respect

NEW DELHI, January 30, 2013: The All India Christian Council has called for a zero tolerance policy on the protection of the dignity and identity of the Dalits and the Tribals of the country, who anyway continue kept out of the development process and see an accelerated pace of the robbing of their natural heritage.

The aicc sharply criticized the remarks made by social scientists and author Ashish Nandy at the Jaipur Lit Festival in which he insinuated that Dalits, Tribals and OBCs were more corrupt than the upper castes.

He has refused to withdraw his remarks, and his explanations have only aggravated the issue.

Dr. Joseph D’ Souza, president of the All India Christian Council, said this is a test case for the law of the land, which is quick to penalize the down trodden but hesitates when it comes to the elite or the politically powerful such as Hindutva hate monger Dr. Praveen Togadia, and others like him.

Prof Nandy’s statement betrays the mind set in intellectual circles and specially in academia which has not come to terms with the rising clamour in the deprived and marginalised sections for their due share in the Indian success story. This assertion for equality at all levels and of dignity and identity comes in conflict with the ego and false pride of the upper castes and classes.

Dr. John Dayal, secretary general of the Christian council, said the organisation had great respect for freedom of speech and intellectual activity, but such freedom should not become a license for hate or spreading canards about communities and people’s groups. Such remarks stigmatize an already alienated people. In fact, it was the colonial British who identified communities as “criminal groups and tribes” and then proceeded to let loose the police on them.

The Council said Prof Nandy’s statement flew in the face of reality and was nor borne out by facts. It was indeed rooted in prejudice.

All the recent scams have shown which social groups are involved in fleecing the nation and stealing its resources. A few caste and class groups have looted the national equity. In fact there are hardly any Dalits at the level of the Secretary to the Government of India, which remains a monopoly of the upper caste groups.

The council reaffirmed its solidarity with the Dalit-Bahujan and Tribal people of the county in their demand that India’s legal systems, parliament and intelligentsia listen to their grievance s and aspirations with greater sensitivity in the seventh decade of the adopting of the Constitution.