Good news for Dalit Christians as govt to bestow SC status

There is good news for 20 million Dalit Christians in India fighting against the deprival of their rights and discrimination faced on grounds of religion.

Reports have emerged that the Union Government is positively cogitating over rendering Schedule Caste (SC) status to Christians from the 'untouchable' background whose change of religion dismantled their social, economical and educational status.

Sources say that Minister of Law and Justice, Veerappa Moily, is anxiously studying the matter and intents to make a prospective decision that would challenge the Constitutional Scheduled Castes Order 1950 that secluded Christians from receiving the SC status.

According to the 1950 order, SC privileges are to be received only by those who profess Hinduism. It, however, was later amended to include Sikhs and Buddhists but not Christians. It was clearly injustice meted out to the Christian community from the last fifty-nine years.

Recently, when a delegation of the National Council of Dalit Christians (NCDC) met with Moily, the Law minister promised that the UPA government was determined to meet the pressing need and that same was yearned by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress president Sonia Gandhi.

Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh YS Rajasekhara Reddy also echoed the same words.

Reddy had recently met with Moily and Congress officials at New Delhi where he pressed for an early action into the case. He later said the new government assured him that the issue was in a critical stage and would be addressed at any cost.

In fact the UPA government already has substantial reasons to approve the SC status for Dalit Christians – the report by Justice Ranganath Mishra Commission.

The Mishra Commission set by the government to study the socio-economic and educational status of Dalit Christians recommended extending the reservation to all Dalits irrespective of religion.

The Commission also argued that by embracing Christianity, the economic status of a Dalit does not improve; therefore the reservation status must be extended.

70% of India's 25 million Christians come from the Dalit background. Dalits are often assigned to the lowest jobs, and live in constant fear of being isolated, publicly humiliated, paraded naked, beaten, and raped.