The Hindu : New agenda for Dalits

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Thursday, Feb 14, 2002

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New agenda for Dalits — I

By Pratap Bhanu Mehta

The "Bhopal Document" squarely faces the challenge that Dalits have to be better prepared to enjoy the gains of the market economy.

THE "BHOPAL Document" issued under the auspices of the Government of Madhya Pradesh to invite "free and frank debate" on the future of Dalits is, on the whole, a well-judged intervention. The document, in its own way, seems to pave the way for some new thinking that moves the Dalit agenda beyond the limited framework of reservation. The overall starting point of the document is unexceptionable. The conditions pf Dalits, compared to the rest of society, remains relatively precarious. Dalits are more likely to be target of atrocities and discrimination, and less likely to possess economic assets adequate for a decent living. But the document tries to address these difficulties in the light of a fuller recognition of two broader changes, one economic and one political.

The simple fact is that reservation has been the primary paradigm of justice within which the discourse of caste has been stuck for quite some time now. Even at its best, while this paradigm served the important function of enhancing Dalit political representation, creating elements of a middle class of Dalit origin, and keeping alive an issue around which Dalit solidarities could take concrete shape, its actual benefits were relatively modest. While the declaration reasserts that all the existing promises on reservation be fulfilled through immediate recruitment, it recognises that access to state jobs will bring only limited gain. Even if the Government did the fiscally improbable thing of filling all existing quotas within a reasonable time frame, it would generate at most, 45 lakh jobs. Giving Dalits a secure economic future would require that they be given access to employment and wealth creating opportunities in the private sector, and greater assets in the form of land in the agriculture sector. The market economy will be politically legitimised largely to the extent to which Dalits gain from it, and the Dalits' well being will be less precarious to the extent that they are able to fully participate in market economy. The report recognises that most of the new wealth and value added will be generated outside the state and the paradigm of empowerment through reservation does little to address that fundamental fact.

Although the declaration does not directly delve into political issues, other than providing a brief on behalf of the Madhya Pradesh Government, there are a couple of important political issues lurking beneath the surface. First, in chapter two, the report explicitly foregrounds a possible tension between a universalistic aspiration of social democracy and the particularity of the discourse of caste. The reality of caste has, on this view, impeded the creation of a genuinely universalistic aspiration of social democracy in at least two ways. Too great an insistence on the caste question creates division amongst groups that might otherwise be possible allies for the democratisation of civil society. Second, the discourse of caste seems to allow for the slow cooption of even sub groups amongst the Dalits. At one point the report speaks of the "upper varnas" and "upper shudras" as the two dominant blocks that own most of the nations assets and public institutions and exclude Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. The report cleverly avoids indicting only "Brahmanism" directly but paints a more varied picture of the sources of Dalit oppression. Since independence, anyone thinking about justice has been caught in a dilemma with respect to caste. On the one hand, talking in a language that eschews caste categories all together renders invisible the specific social form of injustice in India. A discourse of caste is then necessary for empowerment. On the other hand, it should be all but obvious by now that the discourse of caste has often prevented the emergence of genuine anti-caste movements as well. To put the matter somewhat provocatively, we need to make a distinction between an anti-caste movement and an anti-upper caste movement. A genuine anti-caste movement would have the aspiration of dissolving caste as a social category and an axis of subordination. An anti-upper caste movement would simply mobilise to displace existing dominant classes from positions of power. There is no reason to suppose that the latter will result in the creation of conditions propitious for the former. Most anti-caste movements are simply anti-upper caste movements. This fact alone should give those who, in the wake of Mandal, align the discourse of caste politics with a discourse of justice too readily some pause. Indeed, it could be argued that while mobilisation along caste lines has produced a greater fluidity in power relations, such mobilisations do not aim to eradicate the hold of caste. The report seems to explicitly acknowledge that much of what passes of as caste politics is a competition for political power, aimed at displacing certain groups, but which does little to alter the fundamental conditions of Dalits. This report, while it champions the cause of Dalits, tries to position them as bearers of a more universal agenda. It seems that there is beginning to be the recognition that the freedom from caste will have to break open the confines of caste politics as well.

To be sure, some of the proposals attenuate the spirit of social democracy well articulated in the beginning. One of the key demands of the declaration is land reform. The Government should, on this view, distribute surplus land, Government revenue land, and temple land to Dalits, within a reasonable time frame. The report makes a good deal of the fact that the Madhya Pradesh Government has in recent years distributed over one lakh acres of land to 45,000 Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe families and is expected to distribute six lakh acres more, largely by reducing the area of land reserved for grazing. If successful, this scheme will transform about a sixth of Madhya Pradesh's landless agriculture labour into independent cultivators. If this scheme proves to be economically viable, it would set a path-breaking precedent for other States to follow. But it is very clear that the scheme is being targeted almost exclusively towards Dalits and will not consider, in any significant measure, the claims of the almost 35 per cent landless agricultural labour who are not Dalits. This is not a sufficient reason to oppose the scheme, and it has to be acknowledged that these gains are a result of the hard work of Dalit mobilisation. But it also has to be recognised that the political realities of a perceived sense that caste is the important axis of political mobilisation is setting limits on what ought to be normatively contemplated.

The bulk of the report focusses on ways in which Dalits can better access the gains of the market economy. The report points out the striking fact that while the rate of Scheduled Castes' entry into the manufacturing sector is marginally higher than those of others, the rate of shift of the Scheduled Castes to the service sector, where the per capita generation of value is the highest, is lower than for others. Much of the data used in the report is aggregate date, that tells us very little of the dynamics underlying the story. The report places a good deal of stress on the sectoral composition of Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe employment but gives few details on income inequalities within these sectors. But it squarely faces the challenge that Dalits have to be better prepared to enjoy the gains of the market economy.

(The writer is Professor of Philosophy and of Law and Governance, JNU.)

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