From: Peoples Media Advocacy & Resource Centre-PMARC <pmarc2008@gmail.com>
Date: Wed, Jun 2, 2010 at 5:33 PM
Subject: [PMARC] Dalits Media Watch - News Updates 02.06.10
To: Dalits Media Watch <PMARC@dgroups.org>
Dalits Media Watch
News Updates 02.06.10
AP villages caught in caste trap - Times Of India
Programme to train Dalit entrepreneurs - Express Buzz
http://expressbuzz.com/cities/chennai/programme-to-train-dalit-entrepreneurs/178237.html
Atrocities against Dalits on the rise in Nizamabad - Times Of India
Times Of India
AP villages caught in caste trap
TNN, Jun 2, 2010, 04.40am IST
HYDERABAD: Madhusudan (name changed), a Dalit teacher from Warangal town, owns a modest residence at Siddapuram but he does not set foot into his village. Reason: He knows for sure that he will be hacked to death if he does so. This because he married a woman outside his caste about four years back.
Much like the Khap panchayats of northern states that hunt down couples who marry outside their caste, the 'village elders' of Siddapuram had vowed to kill Madhusudan, if he was seen anywhere in the vicinity of his village.
While the Khap threat looms large over several couples who marry outside thier caste in northern states of the country, taking stock of similar atrocities in the state, reveals an even more well-knit network of 'pure breed' enthusiasts who work discreetly to maintain the caste decorum.
Centred around rural areas of the state, these caste panchayats, peopled by members of warring caste communities, keep tabs on youngsters, 'advice' them not to marry outside their caste and also very often unleash violence on those who do not follow their orders.
Victims of their violence often refuse to fight back for fear of their dear lives. Speaking to TOI, Madhusudan said that he would not violate the rules as the memories of the violence which followed his marriage is fresh in his mind even four years later.
"After our marriage we fled to Hyderabad fearing my wife's parents and other members of her community. But when we heard that my parents and siblings would be clubbed to death in our absence, my wife and I returned to the village only to be beaten to pulp. The moment we landed, my wife was abducted by her family and the goons beat me till both my legs got fractured," Madhusudan said, adding that he had not seen his wife till date after the abduction. While unwilling to marry again, Madhusudan swears that he would not want to step into his village.
Ascertaining the overwhelming presence of these 'caste overlords' in village life, another victim of such violence, Saroja, a 36-year-old Dalit woman from Kadapa district, whose father and husband (from Kamma community), were both hacked to death following their controversial marriage way back in 1999, said that she still fears for her life and has moved to Nandiyal. She seldom goes back to Kadapa. "I run a tailoring shop and have not revealed my current base to anyone back home," she said while fighting tears.
Organisations and activists who have been fighting for civil rights of people who marry outside their castes said that such a system has been on in the state since decades with the latest victim being a couple from Nizambad who were killed just two weeks back. "There are cases that date back to the seventies. But what is alarming is that the dictates of the 'elders' are in place even years after the incidence of violence," said Wahid Rahman, secretary of a city based organisation, Kula Mirmulana Samithi which aids inter-caste marriages. He added that the couples used to survive a threat to life only by migrating to cities. "There are instances when couples from these villages migrate to the city for survival. But if they chose to stay in rural areas the threat to their lives or their family members' lives are huge," He said that he had conducted several inter caste marriages as he himself was persecuted for marrying a woman from a different caste and religion.
According to experts, while most cases of violence occur when an upper caste person marries from SC,ST and BC communities, in some stray instances marriages between two upper-caste communities could also instigate these violence. "Violence also occurs when marriages between Reddy, Kamma and Brahmin communities take place even though there is not much of a caste difference," an expert said.
Meanwhile, activists said that the caste rules even displace whole families. "Families with some means move to safer places for help. But this again leads to segregation as members of the same castes cling together for self defence forming easy targets for these moral gurus," a representative from Dalit Stree Sakti.
While the 'elders' are left untouched even by the local law and order authorities, the victims are left to defend themselves, experts said. "In one of the cases that occurred in Suryapet, a year ago the police arrived at the spot a day after the ancestral house of the groom, member of Madiga community who had married a girl from one of the forward castes was torched. No cases were registered," Wahid Rahman said. While 'annihilation of caste' seems to be nowhere in the purview of even the law enforcers, the dictates of the 'elders' seem to make the law of the land.
Express Buzz
Programme to train Dalit entrepreneurs
http://expressbuzz.com/cities/chennai/programme-to-train-dalit-entrepreneurs/178237.html
Last Updated : 02 Jun 2010 08:07:59 AM IST
CHENNAI: A monthlong residential entrepreneur development programme was launched on Tuesday to nurture 25 Dalit entrepreneurs and help them take part in the economic growth of the country.
Chief Secretary K S Sripathy, who inaugurated the programme, said about 50 entrepreneurs have enrolled for the pilot programme, which included 25 Dalits and the rest from other communities.
Hailing the initiative taken by the Indian Institute of Technology in organising such programmes, he said this would develop entrepreneurship skills among youngsters.
P K Mohapatra, chairman of Confederation of Indian Industry - Southern Region, said the CII would provide specialised training to those who had enrolled themselves in the training programme and wish to become an entrepreneur. It would also facilitate their internship to provide them with muchneeded exposure about the industry, he added.
He said with per capita income of India touching $1,000, the nation had graduated from a lowincome country to a middleincome country.
Hailing the role of the State government in empowering Dalits, he said two months ago, the CII conducted a detailed research in south India and found out that about 16.5 per cent of Dalits were employed in private firms. "This is due to wide exposure to formal education," Mohapatra said.
Mohapatra said there were plans to cover 1,000 students annually. Fifty applicants out of 300 were selected from 50 colleges.
Ma Foi Management Consultants founder and MD K Pandia Rajan highlighted how Dalits were emerging as successful entrepreneurs. He stressed on the five mantras to become a successful entrepreneur - ideas and marketing, operations management, identity for the firm, tenacity and cocreation.
Vishwanath Shegaonkar, principal secretary of Adi Dravida and Tribal Welfare Department, said 19 per cent of the population in State were Scheduled Castes and one per cent Scheduled Tribes. "Currently, the State government is spending Rs 25 crore for conducting various training programme for 20,000 Dalits and Rs 10 crore for BCs and MBCs. This training will help students understand the intricacies of business," he said.
A team comprising successful businesspersons, managementtrained facilitators and mentors will groom the participants. Thirty entreprenuers have confirmed to take sessions and coach the budding entreprenuers.
Times Of India
Atrocities against Dalits on the rise in Nizamabad
TNN, Jun 2, 2010, 04.42am IST
NIZAMABAD: It appears that the honour killing incident at Krishnajivadi where a Dalit youth along with his upper caste wife were stoned to death on May 26 was not an isolated one. Three persons belonging to Scheduled Caste (SC) community were murdered by upper caste people in Nizamabad district in the last fortnight.
In what could be a pointer to an alarming rise in the attacks on SCs/STs in the district, a senior police official said 35 cases pertaining to attacks on Dalits have been reported till May this year. They include two murder, five rape, five causing injury and eight other cases registered under various sections of the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.
Madiga Reservation Porata Samithi (MRPS) state vice-president R Nampalli told TOI that the family members of Baddam Swapna Reddy had killed Sunkari Srinivas on the night of May 26 because they could not reconcile to the fact that the youth belonged to the SC community. "The macabre incident in Krishnajivadi in full view of villagers only exposes how Dalits are being treated in villages and mandals by the cash-rich upper caste people," he fumed.
While land disputes is said to be one of the prime reasons for the increasing attacks on Dalits, love affairs and extra-marital relations often lead to murders of Dalit youths. Karrolla Sailu, 40, was stabbed to death by one Goli Narayana Reddy and his associates in broad daylight in front of State Bank of Hyderabad in Yellareddy town on May 21.
What was the provocation? "Narayana Reddy killed Sailu suspecting that the latter had developed intimacy with his wife," a police official said. The victim used to work in the fields of Narayana Reddy in Lingampalli village of Lingampet mandal. In another case, a Dalit youth was allegedly killed in Kamareddy division on May 15. His crime was having an illegal affair with the wife of an upper caste.
In another instance, a land dispute took the life of Bhavanipet Sudarshan, 40, who was beaten to death by his upper caste opponents in Kamareddy on May 18. Sudarshan had a piece of land on the Sirsilla road, which was assigned by the government 20 years back. The adjacent land owners — Mudam Laxminarayana and Mudam Narasimhulu — kept pressuring Sudarshan to sell his land to them. "When he refused to part with his land, the Mudam brothers attacked him with sticks and killed him in his field," police sources said.
Though there has been a spurt in the number of cases registered under the SC/SC Act with each passing year, the accused continue to go scot-free due to lack of evidence or political influence. In 2009, 92 cases under SC/ST Act, including two murder, four rape and 12 causing hurt, were registered in the district. While 83 cases were booked in 2008, 74 cases under SC/SC Act were registered in the year before.
"Though special provisions have been provided to protect the interests of Dalits and other weaker sections, the police officials misuse the Act to bail out the accused belonging to upper castes," Dalit Morcha leader Gandham Veeresham said.
--
.Arun Khote
On behalf of
Dalits Media Watch Team
(An initiative of "Peoples Media Advocacy & Resource Centre-PMARC")
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Peoples Media Advocacy & Resource Centre- PMARC has been initiated with the support from group of senior journalists, social activists, academics and intellectuals from Dalit and civil society to advocate and facilitate Dalits issues in the mainstream media. To create proper & adequate space with the Dalit perspective in the mainstream media national/ International on Dalit issues is primary objective of the PMARC.
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