Pastor Paul P.Radha krishnan.
India.
Greetings in Jesus name.
Last week The Revenue Divisional officer,Tasildar,Revenue inspetor,Village administrative officer etc..came to a new beliver's(FROM A DALIT) house,and searched the house violently.Then they declered that they failed to live according to rules of India,so they are going to lost their benefits in the Government.Do you know what kind of fault they did? JUST THEY HAVE CHRISTIAN STICKER IN THEIR HOUSE WALL.


We are writing to update you on the outcome of the recent Supreme Court hearing in India, dealing with the need for Dalit (formerly known as ‘untouchable’) Christians to be awarded equal rights with Dalits professing the Hindu, Buddhist and Sikh religions.



As we explained in the email earlier, this issue was due to be brought before the Supreme Court on 25 August.  The hearing was brought forward to 23 August, when the Attorney General asked for an adjournment to 18 October, and stated that the responsibility for this decision has been referred to an unnamed commission.



Only a week later did it emerge that the commission in question was to be the Justice Rangnath Mishra National Commission for Linguistic and Religious Minorities.



This response came as a surprise to the Christian and Dalit activists who had been lobbying the Government.  The Mishra Commission was established in 2004, to investigate economic and social backwardness among religious and linguistic minorities.  Its mandate had not previously included making decisions about the constitutional issue of caste among non-Hindu religions.



The petition for equal rights has been widely supported in India, including by CSW’s partner organisation, the All India Christian Council (AICC), the All India Catholic Union, Voice of Dalits International and other church and Dalit groups across the country.



The argument made in the Supreme Court on behalf of the petitioners affirmed that, ‘There is no rational basis whatsoever for distinguishing between the Buddhists and Sikhs on the one hand and the Christians on the other for being considered as members of the Scheduled Castes’.
 
Background information

For 3,000 years, Indian society has been organised by its fourfold caste system.  However, approximately 25% of India’s population (over 250 million people) falls below the caste ladder, and these Dalits have faced centuries of oppression at the hands of the upper castes.  Dalits perform the most menial and hazardous jobs in India, and many Dalit women are sold into prostitution.  The literacy rate among Dalits is very low.  Because they are considered by the Hindu religion to be a polluting influence, Dalit communities live in a considerable degree of segregation from the upper castes.  Many restaurants, for example, keep separate drinking vessels for Dalit use, and Dalits often live downstream of the higher castes.  This separation even extended to the relief camps set up in south-east India following the tsunami.  Within the Hindu caste system, there is no escape for Dalits.



In 1950, in an effort to address some of the injustices faced by the Dalit community, the Government of India introduced the Constitution (Scheduled Castes) Order, which bestowed so-called ‘Scheduled Caste’ status on Dalits.  As ‘Scheduled Castes’, Dalits have been given quotas of reserved places in the central and state governments, in employment and in educational establishments, and preferential treatment in the allotment of low-income housing and the distribution of agricultural land.  However, the 1950 Order contained the proviso that if Dalits should convert from Hinduism to another religion, they would lose their Scheduled Caste status, and the privileges that this entails.  In effect, this obstructs the freedom of Dalits to freely adopt a religion of their choice, which is in contravention of international standards.



The law has been altered twice; once in 1956 to include Sikhs, and again in 1990 to include Buddhists.  However, Christian and Muslim Dalits are still denied equal rights even with other Dalits.  Although a Bill was brought to the Indian Parliament in 1996, proposing to change the law to include Christians, sadly that session of Parliament was dissolved before any legislation could be introduced.



Now, the 1950 Order is being challenged again.  The Christian community has been vigorously lobbying the Government of India to reintroduce legislation with the same intent as the 1996 Bill, and thereby to redress the inequality.