Fighting for Justice

I guess my parents brought me up wrong.  I can’t for the life of me recognise or differentiate between an Iyer or Iyengar, a SC or ST, a Dalit or whatever.  Life has indeed given me opportunity to learn and I have, but in a very limited way.  I can recognise a Sikh because of his turban or a Marwari after he has bested me in a business deal. Sometimes the Banerjee or Chaterjee tells me they are from Bengal. Give me a Rao and I am lost since I have no idea if he is from Karnataka or Andhra.  What the hell, till he filed his nomination at Varanasi and BJP went to town talking of how Modi is a OBC I never knew that. Always thought he was one of those rich Marwaris like Lalit Modi or Russi Modi till someone whacked me on the head and said that Russi Modi was a Parsi.   In that sense I am intellectually challenged or should I say religiously caste challenged. 

A lifetime in sales has given me the opportunity to better deal and understand people depending upon which region they come from and adapt myself to their idiosyncrasies but I can’t recognise a  SC or ST to save my life.  In between in the recent past our high fly page 3 society crowd coined a new term intolerance and which people are suddenly intolerant.  Today even Karan Johar has some view which he says he can’t express in India.  That set me thinking – are these new developments that I was blind to, or did they exist before but called by different names or simply tolerated? So I decided to get into my time machine and do a flash back.

When I was a kid, maybe 5 to 7 years old, my father, a railway officer, was always posted in some project site in a god forsaken place.  We lived in some ramshackle place called house but when dad went out on tour for a couple of days he stayed in tents, crapped in the fields. I stopped going out with him because I could not crap in the fields sitting next to some guy who chatted with the servant who stood watch over me and looked after me and kept asking if I had finished yet. So my life revolved around the labourers and playing with them since they could not refuse to play with the boss’s son. So they played football, cricket, hide and seek etc with me and tolerated me. I am quite sure they were of various religions, castes etc.  The only guy as a kid I recognised was a Muslim, my dad’s driver since he had a beard without a turban so he was not a sardarji.

I loved eating the food these servants brought with them – the jowar roti, bajre ki roti and so on till the page 3 crowds with fancy restaurants started making them famous with fancy names. If not, these were the staple food that the poor ate. And I shared their plate. My mom was embarrassed not because I ate with the servant (and remembering many names they were surely not high caste folks) but I was depriving the servant of his meagre meal. Finally she found a solution; she used to pay the servant to bring some extra food for me and then finally learnt how to make those rotis by asking the servants wife to come over and teach her.

In my house the driver and peon who cared for my father had the pride of place. They had to be served coffee, tiffin, food first before anyone else including my father. So my ability to understand discrimination was poor.

Studying in a different school, in a different state every year  I was the proverbial nomad learning new languages, making new  friends and invariably they were either the servants or their children. I studied in ramshackle government schools and fancy Christian convents so learnt to speak fluent English and reasonably good behaviour coupled with a zone of comfort using coarse dirty language and cuss words.

My first memory of discrimination was as a 13 year old in 1972 when I had to get admission into a school for 8^th class in Kerala.  Kerala those days was the strongly leftist, communist society that wanted an equal society. Nobody was willing to take me for whatever reason – I was not a Christian, I was not eligible, I was not qualified, I was not................  and so on. Trudging from school to school in Trivandrum I began to wonder why am I not wanted by anybody?

I finally got admission in a school (after the government used a sledge hammer) which was started by idealistic elder teachers to operate like a kind of gurukul as against a formal school. From day 1 these teachers, some old enough to be my grandfathers harassed me, ill treated me, discriminated against me and I had no idea why. A classmate, who coincidentally also named Ravindran, again a kid hoisted on to the school but more street smart than me, said that it is because we were not Malayalis, we were not their caste, we were outsiders.  If I went to school at all it was because of just 2 reasons – our school was adjacent to a girl’s college and my friend Ravindran though why the former attracted me I had no idea.  Incidentally this school was ruled and managed by high caste, high class and orthodox folks as I came to know later, much later.

Soon things came to a boil and labourers went on strike, police refused to help us when threatened with violence, there was graffiti all over the town Neyyantinkara near Trivandrum – all because my father a Karnataka guy was posted as the big boss of the local railway project. They wanted only a Malayali to get the position. Even the state govt refused to intervene saying that we deserved it as outsiders. So much for communist, egalitarian, equal society they spoke about and which is why even today I have utter contempt for communists.  The central govt refused to budge and finally we were forced to shift from a big house to living on the Trivandrum city railway platform in a room converted as our “house”. Evenings were spent playing on the platform since who knows what dangers lurked outside. A jeep and driver ferried me to school and guarded me which only exacerbated the anger within others.  Finally a kindly teacher who taught us Social Studies called my father and said that if I was not taken out of the school the management had decided to fail me till I left the school. So we should announce that I was leaving the school and he would prevail upon the management not to fail me in the final exams of 8^th class.

Shifting to Bangalore for studying in my 10^th school in 9 years life was different, and bliss till I completed my 12^th and had dreams of becoming a doctor. Both my grandparents, a couple of aunts, cousins were all doctors. Finishing 12^th in 1977 with 87 % what I then felt was very good marks I went to buy the application form for admission to medical college. The guy at the window took the money and asked my name and then asked “Brahminna?” I said yes. He returned my money and said “dont waste money, nobody will give admission to a Brahmin in a medical college with such low marks”. He refused to even issue the application form. Then started my trudging from college to college with refusals for either being a Brahmin so marks not good enough or that I did not have domicile certificate. By this time even the BSc admissions were over and I was in a panic. Went running back to my old college and barging into the Principals room I broke down weeping and literally fell at his feet and held it begging him to somehow save me.  He consoled me and said that he would give me admission to do BSc and I should go fill up the forms and pay the fees.

Walking out I met my classmate and a friend even today who asked me why I was crying. I told him and he said – let’s go meet my father, Chamaraju. This gentleman was rich, influential and even owned the Bangalore palace. But he was one of the most wonderful persons I have ever met. 

 

Late Mr. Chamaraju & Mr. Chandrasekar Raju

Listening to my plight he said that I should immediately get into his car with him and he would drive down to Mangalore and he would admit me into Manipal Medical College. In 1977 you paid INR 2 Lakhs and waited for a year to get admission there but he assured immediate admission. We said that, I was poorer than a barn mouse. He said no money needed, he would fund it. Honestly we did not have the courage to accept such largesse and prevailed upon him and he finally got me admitted to an engineering college.

Finishing college, getting admission into Post Graduation at IRMA life was again bliss – I was still ignorant about castes, religions and still not bitter about life. I refused to identify myself as anything but an Indian if I could.

First year of PG we did a survey on footwear in a village in Gujarat when I saw for myself of how different castes were segregated and how I was told not to venture into low caste areas. I didn’t like it, didn’t accept it but I began to understand it.

We had a 3 month village trip and were to stay in a school building but have all meals etc in the local rich landlord’s house. The eldest son met with us and spoke to us, we had lunch and later I was asked by my Prof & class fellow if I had understood the implications of the conversation. I had no idea. He said wait for dinner. When we went to dinner we sat just outside the kitchen and one of the daughter in-laws of the house served us. After the meal he again asked me if I had understood. I was equally perplexed. They then explained to me that during lunch the son had indirectly ascertained my caste and accordingly I was now “acceptable” and so I could be allowed to sit inside the house and the ladies of the house interact with us. The 3 months in the village did teach me a thing or two about the caste system we have.

In my 2^nd year in 1984 posted on a project in Lucknow I used to have lunch in the office canteen and drank water from a jug placed on the window. One day the office peon and canteen guy came to me saying that my presence was “not acceptable”. I was alarmed. They explained that as a “high caste” guy and an “officer” I should not come to the canteen. They would serve me at my table. I should not use the jug for water. The peon would serve me the water. I protested and refused till a senior officer gently told me to shut up and listen to what they told me. For the next 3 months I felt as stupid as I could every single day and cringed every time I ordered meals/water.

In 2012 when my daughter was to go for a project in Lucknow I told her this story and she scoffed at me saying “which world are you in?”. Returning she said that she wasn’t allowed to spit out her chewing gum at the clients place and a peon would take it in a piece of paper from her and throw it. She felt equally stupid. 28 years on nothing had changed.

In one of my jobs in 1990 I had a junior colleague who was a................ He invariably flaunted it or used it as a bargaining chip or argument and I would get irritated. Since his work wasn’t exactly of the highest order I kept reprimanding him. Till one day he was so upset that he said “I am a ............ and didn’t expect you to treat me like this as if I am an inferior person”. I said “I dont care what you are but have you ever thought, maybe you ARE inferior?”  I then told him that if I ever heard him speak of being a ............. I would kick the hell out of him and if he didn’t like it, he can find another job. He found another job and quit soon after. Incidentally the ..............was for the word Brahmin. Two decades later he SMS’d me to say hi but I ignored the message.

In 2012 in Singapore an Indian student studying PG with students from across the globe constantly seemed to have a bee in his bonnet esp with other Indians. No one knew why. Soon some people would avoid him and this only increased the buzzing of his bee. As graduation day approached he confessed to the bee – apparently he was a Dalit and felt that he would be discriminated against. While I can understand the mental pressures he may have given his past experiences I often find that people contribute to the problems by not willing to break away from the stereotyping.

We often convey by our behaviour a message, that others don’t understand and soon others respond exactly as we “assumed” they would  and this only reinforces our assumptions and our behaviour then gets stronger and in this way we prove “Self  fulfilling prophecies”. This is true of a Indian in a foreign land, a Muslim, a Christian, a Dalit, whoever, where we consciously seek to focus on the identity that we feel may cause issues. It may not be easy to walk away from our life long experiences but there are some attempts that we can make to reduce the risk of this “self fulfilling prophecies”. Let me give an example which may sound simplistic but then often we may need to also remember to Keep It Simple Stupid.

Let us say for example, in Britain, that we notice that there are cases in a place where it is felt that there has been discrimination against Indians. We must first decide if this attitude is across the society we live in or just that some people have this problem. After all we do live in that society and can decide if everyone behaves that way or some few people who may happen to be in power. Most times I would say that society may not display this behaviour but just some. The answer to that is not to create an “Indians against discrimination” organisation but maybe an “Organisation for equality”. In the former what happens is that the masses around you who till then never felt you were different, suddenly start identifying you as an Indian who feels discriminated. They then start being conscious of what they say or do in your presence and the discrimination where none existed gets created. Indians then become a small sub group with a problem. Also the others in society who also may have similar issues like say from Pakistan, Nigeria, Vietnam would not support you but consciously try to become closer to the locals. So you isolate yourself and in short walk around with a sign pinned on your back “I am an Indian kick me”.

If on the other hand the focus is on the issue, then we create the latter organisation which could gain support from all like minded people including local Brits and the folks who indulge in such discrimination face the heat and pressure to change.

Now simply change the word Indian to Dalit and you will find this happening everyday in India. One person gets discriminated and then you have an Ambedkar society or Dalit sangharshak society and soon the majority of the people around you identify the members as a Dalit which they never knew of till then. And their behaviour changes not because they discriminate but they don’t want to get into any unpleasantness given that you have just announced to the world that you have a bee in your bonnet. The same self fulfilling prophecy plays out again and again and again.

While it is fact that caste discrimination still exists in large parts of India, fact also is that it has considerably reduced from what I have seen in my own lifetime.  Education, Urbanisation has been the greatest leveller of such discrimination.  Lack of opportunity only increases such discrimination since when someone is denied an opportunity it is the easiest thing today to blame the outside world than look within or accept the situation or fight against it. Also when the political class is easily pressurised by such blame games then it is natural for people to use these as weapons.  

Often many find it easy to climb up the political ladder they are aiming for by using such weapons and sooner than later some come to grief when a rung of the ladder suddenly snaps. These weapons in our society cut both ways. Unfortunately in this process it leaves many citizens hurt and bruised while those opportunistic vultures who have managed to continue climbing, move to the next issue, the next controversy leaving behind the injured and dead to fend for themselves. After all how many today remember Kalavathy, Gajendra, countless farmers who committed suicide. For those who remember 1975 how many remember Rajan? The main accused went on to become CM and Central cabinet minister honoured by all and sundry. As long as an incident has political benefits it will find a place in the sun but the issue by itself will remain buried. As long as we identify ourselves by narrow definitions of our identity, rather than issues, the identity will subsume all issues and even justice leaving us forgotten or dead.

The link below directly and indirectly also speaks the same language I have above.

http://www.dailyo.in/politics/rohith-vemula-hyderabad-university-dalit-abvp-sfi-ambedkar-student-politics-nsui-intolerance/story/1/8609.html

The bottom-line is that discrimination and intolerance has been prevalent since time immemorial and life is all about constantly fighting to change the status quo and trying to make the world a better place. The winners decide what is defined by a better world. And if we desire that status quo changes faster and the definition of better world really means better we must as a society focus on the ISSUES and not on the identities. That is where WE need to first change. WE must fight whether in person or online to focus on ISSUES rather than become a part of the problem instead of the solution. You may fight a lone battle, others may call you names ranging from secular, liberal, bhakth, adarsh, internet hindoo, communal and many more but WE are the change we want to be.