A House of Lords Bill has been welcomed by Dalits, (Untouchables) who suffer extreme violence and persecution, but has been rejected by the Indian Govt. Over 250 million Dalits are denied water, access to schools, and in some cases right to pass through villages by Hindus. Some Dalits still work as scavengers transporting human waste from latrines. A report by the anti-Caste Discrimination Alliance, surveyed 300 British Asians and cited cases of children being bullied at school, bus inspectors refusing to work with lower caste drivers, and employees being sacked after their bosses discovered their caste status. Until now victims of caste apartheid in Britain had no recourse to law. India has a name-sake law but it is fiercely opposed to any comparison with racism. Caste and race discrimination are two separate issues and there is no case to equate the two. We are opposed to attempts at international fora to equate the issues, an Indian official said.
Hindu racism in UK: Prasun Sonwalkar, London, adds:
http://news.rediff.com/interview/2010/mar/31/uk-close-to-banning-caste-based-discrimination.htm
The Equity Bill will now face final consideration by the House of Commons prior to receiving royal assent. It is expected to become law before the general election expected in early May.
The amendments suggested by the House of Lords on April 6 included a power to outlaw discrimination on the basis of caste; a ban on asking for health and disability information prior to making a job offer; and removing the ban on civil partnership ceremonies taking place in religious premises. There has been mounting evidence of the prevalence of caste-based discrimination among people with origins in the Indian subcontinent.
Keith Porteous Wood, Executive Director of the National Secular Society, said: “The blight of caste discrimination, under which millions in India are regarded as ‘Untouchable’, has spread to this country virtually unnoticed.” In November 2009, research conducted in the universities of Manchester, Hertfordshire and Manchester Metropolitan University said tens of thousands of people with origins in the Indian sub-continent faced caste discrimination in Britain.
The new study, whose main conclusion is that there is considerable evidence of caste-based discrimination among the Asians in Britain, was coordinated by the Anti-Caste Discrimination Alliance and included academics from three universities.
The report, titled “Voice of the Community – A Study into Caste and Caste Discrimination in the UK”, says that the caste system is widespread and that it affects tens of thousands of people in the workplace, the classroom and even the doctor’s surgery.
The study says: “There is clear evidence from the survey and the focus groups that the caste system has been imported into the UK with the Asian diaspora and that the associated caste discrimination affects citizens in ways beyond personal choices and social interaction. “There is a danger that if the UK Govt. does not effectively accept and deal with the issue of caste discrimination the problem will grow unchecked.”
