Dalits in Malari village of Ghazipur in east Uttar Pradesh trying to “exercise their franchise” learnt that “exercise” was the appropriate word for the task. Finding out why meant visiting the polling station with these residents of an “Ambedkar village” in Barachawar block on February 16. “Ambedkar villages” are those selected by the Uttar Pradesh…
Decades after the abolition of untouchability, it is alive and well in parts of Uttar Pradesh. Add to that a touch of begar, or forced, unpaid labour, and life can be tough for a dalit in Ghazipur. Writer-journalist P. SAINATH in the second of a series of exclusive reports from around the country on the conditions of…
Caste, known as jati, or endogamous groups in local parlance, has been a system of social relations central to the Hindu society for centuries. Its central notions are hierarchy based on ideas of pollution and inclusion-exclusion. As an ascriptive system, the caste system is highly inflexible. The four varnas, which are considered to be in a way…
Kapil Deo was born on March 1, 1964, in a family of Dalit couple Kesari Devi and Laxmi Prasad residing in Malari village near Barachawar development block headquarters in Ghazipur district. He has six sisters and one brother. His father worked as a labour to eke out his livelihood and used to sing in spare…
