Insertion of ‘insult’ in the NCRB report gives us a fresh perspective on Dalit atrocities and helps us take the empowerment conversation ahead.

NCRB adds ‘insult’ to crimes against Dalits. And yes, merit argument is an insult

Insertion of ‘insult’ in the NCRB report gives us a fresh perspective on Dalit atrocities and helps us take the empowerment conversation ahead.

Members of Dalit community display a portrait of Bhim Rao Ambedkar during 'Bharat Bandh' in New Delhi | PTI

One of the most interesting takeaways from the latest National Crime Records Bureau report on 2017 data was the recognition of a variety of crimes committed against Dalits. And that now includes insults.

The much-debated Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 explains the concept of insult and social ostracism in a detailed manner. 

Insult has many layers, especially in the context of caste.

The lack of acceptance of the Dalit community stems from an utter lack of empathy. This eventually leads to insults and ostracisation. Insulting Dalits has become an every-day affair in India. It is an attempt to show them their “place” in the social hierarchy.

The merit insult

When it comes to insults, let’s look at how jobs discriminate against SCs and STs.

There is a critical lack of representation of Dalits at crucial decision-making positions where it matters. Bureaucracy, think tanks, media, judiciary and academics are yet to witness a surge of Dalits in higher echelons.

A report 2018 said: “A study by Thorat and Attewell in 2010 observed that for equally qualified SC and upper caste (about 4800 each) applicants, SCs had 67 percent less chance of receiving calls for an interview. What is more disturbing is that the high percentage of less qualified high castes (undergraduate) received calls compared with the more qualified SCs (post-graduates).” What can be more insulting than that? Even after being more skilled and competent, you are less like to receive a call for an interview if you are a member of a Scheduled Caste. And yet, the argument of merit has been systematically been used as a tool of insult against the members of socially disadvantaged communities.

Back in our college, the concept of merit also led to ghettoisation of students belonging to a certain social background. One particular incident from my college days is still fresh in my memory. I participated in a debate spoke in English. This caused a section of the class to laugh at me. An upper-caste student had remarked: “Now we have to listen to these lesser mortals speaking in English as well?” At that age, it was difficult for me to imagine the gravity of the statement. It was insulting to be continuously reminded of the fact that “you don’t need to study and work hard, you will manage because you have reservations”.

With the emergence of people like Tina Dabi and Kanishak Kataria (both of them topped the UPSC exam, the stigma against Dalits has been somewhat dented.

Even so, daily insults, conscious or unconscious, cause a deep scar that most in the SC/ST community have to continuously carry.

Defying insults

There is a lack of academic resources on the impact of years of institutional oppression faced by Dalits. There should be a comprehensive study to measure the loss due to social discrimination over the years, like it has been explored in the United States.

This inclusion of ‘insult’ as a category was deliberately ignored by the Indian mainstream commentariat on the expected lines. The Ministry of Home Affairs deserves to be applauded because this monumental change will have far-reaching implications in Dalit studies. This change, coupled with other progressive measures like mentorship and handholding of first-generation Dalit entrepreneurs with schemes like Stand-up India, will help boost Dalit confidence.

There is a sense of instant dignity for us the moment we enter the newly constructed Dr Ambedkar International Centre at Janpath in New Delhi. It gives us a sense of ownership, of something tangible at India’s heart, as we witness the towering statue of Ambedkar sitting with his legs crossed in the Centre. The elites who deliberately kept the doors of the Indian International Centre closed for decades are surely scared of this democratisation. The Ambedkar Centre is particularly popular among Dalit intellectuals who are becoming a part of the system and ensuring that it is more open and transparent. That’s how you talk back to insults. They will not be a victim of unwelcoming glances that await them in the IICs and IHCs of New Delhi.

For the first time in the history of Independent India, there is institutional support for the emergence of a Dalit voice. Dalits are being heard and are not merely regarded as a political commodity. The time is not far when Dalits will seek to contest from unreserved constituencies and political parties would no longer be in a position to ignore their demands.

The insertion of ‘insult’ in the NCRB report will eventually give us a fresh perspective on Dalit atrocities and help us take the Dalit empowerment conversation ahead.

Author  : Shivam Vij / 25oct 2019 .

The author is an Assistant Professor at Patna University. He is a member of the state executive committee, Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha, BJP’s youth wing, Bihar. Views are personal.

Sewer robots and other technology aim to end caste-based scavenging, which regularly costs lives. But are they enough?

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For India’s Caste-Based Sewer Cleaners, an Uncertain Robot Rescue

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Sewer robots and other technology aim to end caste-based scavenging, which regularly costs lives. But are they enough?

Visual: CHANDAN KHANNA/AFP/Getty Images

The Indian government defines a “manual scavenger” as a person who physically carries human excreta. Often without safety gear — no helmets, masks, or gloves — these workers plumb the manholes of Mumbai, waist-deep in grey silt and sludge, searching for sewer-clogging debris: feces, sanitary pads, hospital refuse, plastic bags, and tree roots. With buckets full and fumes threatening to overtake them, they exit for a few moments, and then descend again. For their service, and if they are lucky, the city might pay them a monthly salary of about 14,500 rupees, or roughly $200.

Manual scavenging is technically illegal in India, but in practice it thrives across the country. The 2011 Socioeconomic and Caste Census estimates that more than 182,000 Indians work as manual scavengers, while human rights groups peg the number at 770,000. Milind Ranade, founder Kachra Vahatuk Shramik Sangh, a Mumbai-based organization focused on addressing labor issues — especially those pertaining to waste collectors — says that manual scavenging is a caste-based profession, largely limited to the Dalit community, which is considered as the lowest echelon of the Indian society.

In some cases, “the ancient caste system still dictates a person’s occupation in India, and for Dalits, it means a life of dehumanising work as manual scavengers,” says Ranade. Historically known as “untouchables” or outcasts, Ranade says, “even the state does not care about them.”

In response to such indifference, the country’s Supreme Court has called on the government to step up enforcement, calling manual scavenging both uncivilized and inhuman. “Why are you not providing them masks and oxygen cylinders?” the court asked Attorney General Kottayan Katankot Venugopal on Wednesday. “In no country in the world, people are sent to gas chambers to die.”

While the practice continues, some researchers and companies are busy building solutions that might well displace manual scavengers: sewer robots and other technological solutions that can sweep out debris and keep tunnels clear. In July 2018, the Indian government launched a “Technology Challenge,” inviting innovators to devise additional technology-based alternatives to this noxious work.

So far, the technology is expensive and has had limited reach — and it also does little to address the injustices ingrained in India’s rigid caste system. But for many stakeholders, these sorts of technological interventions can’t come soon enough: Deaths due to suffocation, drowning in turgid waters, and oxygen depletion are a common occurrence in the profession. According to official figures, one manual scavenger died in India every five days between January 2017 and September 2018. Meanwhile, data from Safai Karmachari Andolan (SKA), a nationwide movement to eradicate manual scavenging, states that at least 1,790 manual scavengers died at work between 2010 and mid-2019.

Sanitation workers are also prone to skin and respiratory tract infections, tuberculosis, malaria, and dengue, among other illnesses. “Eight years of manual scavenging have left me with fungal infections on my hands and legs,” said one worker who asked not to be named because previous press coverage of sewer workers resulted in loss of work. “But the government has provided no medical help or financial assistance to cure the ailment. Requests for protective gear and proper equipment have fallen on deaf ears — even as deaths of manual scavengers are reported regularly in India.”

Sunil Bhosale, vice president of the Jan Jagruti Foundation — a non-governmental organization (NGO) that works to address health issues among sanitation workers in Mumbai — shares that the job also leads to chronic alcoholism and resultant illnesses. He cites the example of Mallesh Albai, a 38-year-old manual scavenger, who had been cleaning sewers on contract for six years, and died after suffering from liver enlargement, unable to afford the medical expenses.

Shaileshkumar Darokar, a social scientist with the Mumbai-based Tata Institute of Social Sciences, studies urban sanitation and solid waste management. He noted in an article last year that in a technology-driven world, where India aspires to become a super power, “it is shameful that we still ask fellow humans to descend into manholes.”

“We can bring in technology and employ the same workers to handle the machines,” Darokar says. “No civilized society should allow such a practice. Fifth and sixth generations of Dalit families are still employed in the profession — a perfect example of how caste continues to perpetuate discrimination and ostracization in India. Technology has to become the alternative.”

People hold placards during a protest against the violation of Manual Scavenging Prohibition Act 2013, at Jantar Mantar, on September 25, 2018 in New Delhi, India. Visual: Sushil Kumar/Hindustan Times via Getty Images

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Ending the practice of manual scavenging won’t be easy. The profession is deeply rooted in the Indian caste system, which dates back 2,000 years. The system, for centuries, has dictated aspects of the Hindu social, professional, and religious life, pushing Dalits to cleaning manholes and sewers — even as the Constitution of India, adopted in 1949, prohibits caste-based discrimination.

India has also enacted two laws to eradicate the practice — the 1993 Employment of Manual Scavenging and Construction of Dry Latrines (Prohibition) Act and the 2013 Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act.

But the profession continues. Raj Valmiki, a project coordinator with SKA, says the reason lies in the lack of political will to end the practice. He points to the 1993 law, which has a provision that anyone who employs a man or woman as a manual scavenger can be punished with a jail term of up to one year. Still, despite violations, says Valmiki, no one has been held accountable for the offense in the past 26 years.

“It’s not that the profession doesn’t exist, it’s just that it’s conveniently ignored to suit the society’s needs,” says Valmiki. “As for Dalits, who do the job — most of them are uneducated, unaware of legal dogmas. Generations of their families have done the same work, and they hold little hope for careers other than this denigrating profession.”

Shubham Gaikwad, 21, was an 11-year-old boy when he lost his father, Bharat to manual scavenging. Having lost his mother when he was younger, he grew up in a Mumbai slum with his grandmother and a younger sister — his education funded by local NGOs, other expenses footed by irregular monthly donations of 700 rupees ($10) from his father’s co-workers. While growing up, he had heard from his paternal aunt that his father’s job led to tuberculosis and claimed his life. Gaikwad studied harder to evade the hereditary profession.

“I don’t wish to be a manual scavenger,” says Gaikwad, who recently graduated from college, and is now looking for a job. “But if I have to, I’ll do it. Like my father, I have little choice.”

Another reason for the existence of manual scavenging, says Valmiki, is the usage of dry latrines in India. According to the 2011 House-listing and Housing Census, India has 2.6 million such “insanitary” latrines, which require human excreta to be cleaned or handled manually from open drains, where the waste is discharged before it decomposes. According to the 2013 Act, the local authority is responsible for identifying dry latrines, and demolishing and converting them into sanitary ones.

“But the government is not inclined to implement its own laws,” says Valmiki.

It has been more than 25 years since India outlawed manual scavenging, and six years since the latest legislation stated that it is the “duty of every local authority and other agency to use appropriate technological appliances for cleaning of sewers, septic tanks, and other spaces within their control.” But it is only now that the first technological innovations are emerging. In March 2019, the Delhi government deployed 200 mechanized systems, which were provided to skilled manual scavengers in a bid to end the practice, and turn sanitation workers into “sani-entrepreneurs.”

Bandicoot, for example, is a 110-pound sewer robot with a robotic arm with 360-degree motion, which plucks out solid waste and collects it in a bucket. It has an attachable water jet, which clears sewage blockages while a camera enables operators to see footage of the manhole from inside.

“Bandicoot finishes work, which usually takes two hours and at least three manual scavengers, in 20 minutes,” says Arun George, one of Bandicoot’s designers and co-founder of GenRobotic Innovations, which developed the machine in 2015. So far, the company has 25 of the robots in seven Indian states. “Our aim is to transform manholes into robo-holes,” adds George.

Like Bandicoot, Sewer Croc, named after its reptilian look, is another such tech-based solution: the machine maneuvers sewer lines on spring-loaded Teflon wheels and uses using its cutting blades and high-velocity water jet to cut through debris.

Valmiki supports the move toward these machines. “The use of technology for cleaning sewers is still in its nascent stages in India, and the long-term ramifications will be known with time. But it is certainly a respectable starting point since it is aimed at saving lives,” he says. “We have been suggesting tech-based innovators to train the same manual scavengers in handling their machines so there is no loss of livelihood.”

“Bandicoot finishes work, which usually takes two hours and at least three manual scavengers, in 20 minutes,” says Arun George, one of Bandicoot’s designers and co-founder of GenRobotic Innovations.

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Reactions to tech-based innovations have been mixed. While rights groups do welcome the solutions, many activists say technology alone can’t rid India of the practice. They call for a rehabilitation plan for sanitation workers — should robots replace them — and also for long-term, sustainable social change, which ensures that no person, regardless of their caste, is coaxed to manually clean the sewers.

Vijay Dalvi, a Mumbai-based activist who advocates for the welfare of sanitation workers, feels that the advancement of technology is already belated, and that the Indian government must first acknowledge the existing victims of the profession. “In the past three years, 265 manual scavengers have died in Mumbai alone — either on the job, or due to illnesses contracted because of their jobs,” he says. “Not one of their families has been compensated so far — despite petitions, prayers, and recurrent follow-ups.” Dalvi adds that while he supports the introduction of new technology to avoid accidental deaths, it must not lead to unemployment or the denial of work to existing manual scavengers.

Other rights activists add that technology needs to be accompanied with a strong rehabilitation and compensation plan. Ranade points to rehabilitation provisions outlined in the 2013 Act, which grant manual scavengers a one-time cash assistance, financial help for house construction, legal and pragmatic assistance, training in a livelihood skill, as well as a concessional loan for taking up an alternative occupation on a sustainable basis.

There needs to be awareness about these rights-based state-sanctioned provisions, Ranade says. He adds that manual scavenging is an epitome of social injustice, and the profession will persist until the problem of caste-based discrimination is addressed.

“If Dalits quit scavenging, how will they afford a life? Even today, the community is expected to clean feces — even as members of other castes would prefer unemployment over this humiliating work,” says Ranade. “There are cases where Dalits have set up grocery shops in villages, and no one has come to their stores since they’re untouchables. Their freedom, even if it arrives through technology, has to be sustainable.”