Introduction: Untouchable boundaries : Chamars and the politics of identity and history -- Making Chamars criminal : the crime of cattle poisoning -- Investigating the stereotype : Chamar peasants and agricultural laborers -- Is the leather industry a Chamar enterprise? : the making of leatherworkers -- Struggle for identities : Chamar histories and politics -- From Chamars to Dalits : the making of an achhut identity and politics, 1927-56 -- Conclusion: Overcoming domination : the emergence of a new achhut identity -- Appendix: Statistical tables -- Glossary
Abstract Drawing from publications by Swami Achutanand and the Adi-Hindu Mahasabha press between 1916 and 1940, this article examines the role of this north Indian Dalit organization in creating language and categories of liberalism in the Hindi vernacular. The Mahasabha poet-activists published numerous song-booklets in a variety of Hindi song genres to intervene in ongoing discussions on the subjects of representation and equality which they characterized as mulki-haq and unch-niche. Histories of liberties in late colonial India have typically examined its emergence within dominant Hindu and Muslim middle-class groups. This article uncovers the unique contributions of Dalit poet-activists who recognized the value of liberal ideas and institutions in challenging caste and abolishing "Manu's Kanun" (lawgiver Manu's Hindu law codes). It highlights the methodological importance of mohalla (neighborhood) sources usually located in Dalit activists' houses in untouchable quarters. The chapbooks found in mohalla collections have enabled the writing of a new history of the Mahasabha's activism and of the initiatives taken by poet-activists in founding a new Dalit politics in northern India. I explore the emergence of a Dalit literate public which sustained the activities of the Mahasabha and which responded with enthusiasm to its articulation of the new social identity of Achut (untouched) and a new political identity of Adi-Hindus—original inhabitants of Hindustan (India). Offering a new methodological approach in using mohalla sources and song-booklets composed in praise of liberal institutions, this essay makes a significant contribution to the recovery of a forgotten Dalit public sphere in early twentieth-century India.
Rupa Viswanath, The Pariah Problem: Caste, Religion, and the Social in Modern India, New York: Columbia University Press, 2014, pp. 416. P. Sanal Mohan, Modernity of Slavery: Struggles against Caste Inequality in Colonial Kerala, Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2015, 368 pp. Charu Gupta, The Gender of Caste: Representing Dalits in Print, Ranikhet: Permanent Black, 2016, 352 pp.
D.R. Nagaraj, The Flaming Feet and Other Essays: The Dalit Movement in India, ed. Prithvi Datta and Chandra Shobhi, Ranikhet: Permanent Black, 2010, pp. 254.
'. . . [T]he awakened untouchable today is repeatedly asking them [the Congress] if they could not remove the 'social evil' of their own creation without political power, how do they expect us [the untouchables] to liberate ourselves without political power'. (Shastri, Poona Pact. 1946, p. 24)'This is 1946, not 1932'. (Shastri, Poona Pact. 1946, p.76)Shankaranand Shastri's statements help us locate two related propositions that came to constitute Dalit politics in Uttar Pradesh in the 1940s. The first proposition deals with claims made by Dalits to acquire political power—specifically in the form of adequate representation in the provincial legislative assemblies and in the Constituent Assembly. They demanded positive discrimination in the form of reservations within legislative and executive institutions. Safeguards for Dalits, it was argued, should be incorporated into the proposed constitution for Indian citizens. The second proposition concerns achhut identity, through which Dalits hoped to reconstitute their polity in UP. The Scheduled Castes Federation (SCF) and even a section of Congress Harijans staked a claim for achhut identity to distinguish their difference from 'other communities.' Dalit writings increasingly depicted the Poona Pact as a great betrayal by the Congress and the British. From their experience of the two general elections of 1937 and 1946, they argued that the electoral mechanism worked out under the aegis of the Poona Pact was structured against the Dalits.
The academic field of Dalit studies is relatively new, emerging since the 1990s in South Asia and in diasporic communities. Dalit intellectuals theorize Indian historiography and social sciences through the lenses of humiliation and dignity, pointing to the painful history of Dalit groups (formerly called untouchables) and the contemporary perpetuation of caste inequality. As part of a challenge to high-caste Hindu intelligentsia with privileged upbringings, DALIT STUDIES includes a high proportion of Dalit scholars from non-elite social and institutional backgrounds. Contributors analyze the work of Dalit activists across colonial and postcolonial periods, countering a tradition of viewing them as passive victims and objects of reform
The academic field of Dalit studies is relatively new, emerging since the 1990s in South Asia and in diasporic communities. Dalit intellectuals theorize Indian historiography and social sciences through the lenses of humiliation and dignity, pointing to the painful history of Dalit groups (formerly called untouchables) and the contemporary perpetuation of caste inequality. As part of a challenge to high-caste Hindu intelligentsia with privileged upbringings, DALIT STUDIES includes a high proportion of Dalit scholars from non-elite social and institutional backgrounds. Contributors analyze the work of Dalit activists across colonial and postcolonial periods, countering a tradition of viewing them as passive victims and objects of reform. This title was made Open Access by libraries from around the world through Knowledge Unlatched.
Analyzes the role of Dalits (formerly untouchables) in shaping modern India, including discourse about caste, and interrogates the dominant narratives that have been used to represent India's history. This title was made Open Access by libraries from around the world through Knowledge Unlatched. ; Includes bibliographical references and indexes. ; Dalit studies: new perspectives on Indian history and society / Ramnarayan S. Rawat and K. Satyanarayana -- The Indian Nation in its egalitarian conception / Gopal Guru -- Probing the historical -- Colonial archive versus colonial sociology: writing Dalit history / Ramnarayan S. Rawat -- Social space, civil society, and Dalit agency in twentieth-century Kerala / P. Sanal Mohan -- Dilemmas of Dalit agendas: political subjugation and self-emancipation in Telugu Country, 1910-50 / Chinnaiah Jangam -- Making sense of Dalit sikh history / Raj Kumar Hans -- Probing the present -- The Dalit reconfiguration of modernity: citizens and castes in the Telugu public sphere / K. Satyanarayana -- Questions of representation in Dalit critical discourse: Premchand and Dalit feminism / Laura Brueck -- Social justice and the question of categorization of scheduled caste reservations: the Dandora debate in Andhra Pradesh / Sambaiah Gundimeda -- Caste and class among the Dalits / Shyam Babu -- From Zaat to Qaum: fluid contours of the Ravi Dasi identity in Punjab / Surinder S. Jodhka. ; Analyzes the role of Dalits (formerly untouchables) in shaping modern India, including discourse about caste, and interrogates the dominant narratives that have been used to represent India's history. This title was made Open Access by libraries from around the world through Knowledge Unlatched. ; Mode of access: Internet.
