The never ending Caste System of India

                                                             At a time when measuring backwardness based on caste is being challenged, India has to make glance at grassroots caste system that is prevalent in countryside.  SC, ST communities were treated less than human in villages, where they should not step into temples. They can’t ask about their rights which will attract upper caste brutality. I witnessed such an incident today in Gadisingapuram village in Jiyyammavalasa mandal of Vizianagaram. On the eve of village festival being organized, a few youth are dancing to the drums in front of chariot. While it was going through the dalit street, a girl of age fifteen years brought her little niece amidst them just  to look a small move by the child. The drunken youth at seeing the dalit girl coming among them shouted at her “ You bloodh Paidi bitch, how dare you come in front of us” . The girl’s brother who came to her rescue was beaten along with her sister. If they could not reach hospital on time, two precious lives would have been lost. Over the years, it became clear that caste discrimination was not just limited to upper caste whereas land holding Backward Castes as well acrimonious towards dalits and tribes.  The words of BR Ambedkar  about caste discrimination in Hindu religion were proven right even after  seven decades of independence.  Ironically, the assaulters are educated properly and do not know how to respect fellow men.


                                                                                                                                                  Prashant K Snigtha
                                                                                                                              (Writer is a banker, works with rural                                                                                                                                 people and enthusiastic about wirting)

OTHER SIDE OF INDIA SHINING: Maruvada SC and ST

As a part of routine field work I decided to visit villages far remote. Then I was advised by  my help to go to Maruvada, one of the disconnected village in Vizianagaram district in Andhra Pradesh. As usual the place is habitat for SC and ST. They divided the place into SC Maruvada and ST Maruvada. The only properly built pucca house in the habitat is a Church. For an eighty families living over there, the basic amenities such as education, health and drinking water are far away. In case of health emergency, they don't even have facility of public or private transport since there is no road connection with nearby villages.

They had to settle in this remote place in  order to do cultivation, that too as tenant farmers. Lack of concrete roads make it impossible to commute to Maruvada in rainy season. Even for MGNREGS work, they had to go to surrounding villages in Sikhabadi, Jiyyammavalasa or Ravada Ramabhadrapuram. When asked them about due pending for the current EMI, they were helpless just showed me the grains they cultivated which were due for procurement. They state arranged procurement office bearers can't go there to purchase the paddy grain and the businessmen waiting for the correct price to arrive to purchase the paddy grain at cheaper cost. I saw the grains packed in jute bags which will get rotten in case of  rain. The farmers neither have the capability to take the loads of grain to market.

With the deteriorating  climate conditions by the year due to global warming, the case for small and marginal farmers such as in Maruvada is pathetic. The state may feel 'few villagers of Maruvada' but the single Maruvada  represenst hundreds of such villages and millions of people left out of Shining India.

Prashant K Snigtha
15.01.2016