the goan I network
PANAJI
Ever since Prime Minister Narendra Modi came to power in 2014, atrocities against the Dalit community have been increasing, while the figures that prove this are being manipulated or distorted by the Center, said Dr Anand Teltumbde on Tuesday.
Teltumbde was speaking at a Margao-based bookshop where he was giving an introduction to the second edition of the book he edited, “Hindutva and Dalits: Perspectives for Understanding Communal Praxis.”
“Atrocities against Dalits have been rising due to the change in political economy, especially post 2014,” said Teltumbde, a renowned scholar who has long been fiercely critical of the Central’s government’s Hindutva agenda, and as even been arrested for voicing his views.
Teltumbde explained that non-Dalits hold a strong grudge against Dalits especially in rural areas because of the reservation system in the country.
“Dalits were on the receiving end of the Hindtva wave, but figures of atrocities against Dalits have been suppressed post-2014. Even the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), an institutionalised database of crime which used to be internationally respected, is now being manipulated,” Teltumbde said.
He said that the NCRB was internationally respected until 2014. After that it has been too difficult to make head or tail of it. “The 2014 report gives one figures, and the 2016 report gives different figures while referring to the 2014 report. The errors are too big to be reconciled,” the professor at Goa Institute of Management (GIM) said.
He also said that in Modi’s term, there was a two year delay in coming out with the report. When it finally came out, the figures were distorted/manipulated.
The scholar explained that when Hindutva first emerged in India, the RSS was a Brahmin organisation and stayed that way under earlier Hindtva proponents like Hedgewar.
Following that though, Balasaheb Deoras imparted direction to the RSS as he realised that without non-Brahmins, there was no way that the Sangh could make a dent. At that time they were on the margins even electorally.
“So they started saffronising Ambedkar and a lot of Dalit intellectuals were pulled in by the RSS in this manner. The Modus Operandi of the RSS was to persist with this line of theirs, and eventually, it started bearing fruits,” Teltumbde said.
As History would have it, Ambedkar became an icon, and the RSS used the strategy that once they started eulogising Ambedkar, the entire Dalit community would be with them. “In fact, Ambedkar himself said that if Hindu Raj materialises it would be the biggest calamity. But now, Ambedkar is 70-80% saffronised,” Teltumbde said.
Terming Gujarat “Hindutva’s laboratory,” the professor said that suddenly, in the Gujarat carnage in 2002, Dalits were induced to be on the side of the Hindus, even though the anti-Dalit attitude of the right-wing has been pervasive.
“It’s difficult to understand the RSS attitude towards caste and Dalits, as overtly, they have been ambiguous about caste which is typical for upper caste reformers. But to understand Hindutva, the Dalit is the fulcrum, otherwise you will miss out a lot,” Teltumbde said. He also said that the reason the Dalit movement in India right now was scattered is because the community is looking for an Ambedkar-like leader, which has been the bane of the Dalit movement. “Ambedkar was a product of his times. The Dalit movement has been in search of a new Ambedkar, but if they had kept him in his time and accepted a new leader, even if he doesn’t eulogise Ambedkar, the movement wouldn’t be so fragmented,” Teltumbde said.
“Hindutva and Dalits” is a collection of essays that brings Dalits to the centerstage, and makes people more aware about the unexplored part of the Dalit community. The session was moderated by Leonard Fernandes, co-founder, Cinnamon Teal Publishing.
