Exploring the Margins: Caste, Class and Gender Identity

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Dalits, in India are considered the most contaminating beings since time immemorial. Positioned at the lowest rung of caste hierarchy, Dalits are socially segregated, economically. Educationally destitute, and politically and geographically marginalised. They are stigmatised and marred by the long revered religio-cultural ideological structures and the fiats of caste which expose them to exploitation, humiliation, physical violence and perpetual impecuniousness. Divested of rights and dignity, Dalits have led lives of sub-human beings for centuries as they were traditionally denied voice and coerced to silently observe the edicts of caste. It was only with the advent of Bhimrao Ramaji Ambedkar that the distress, indignation, and resistance of Dalits found a systematic expression at a pan- India level, though, before him also some Dalit intellectuals such as Jyotirao Govindrao Phule, Iyothee Thass, Periyar, Narayana Guru, Harichand, Guruchand Thakur and others had also voiced their protest against caste-based oppression. As the champion of rights and emancipation of the deprived sections, Ambedkar awakened Dalits and organised them to speak against dominant socio-economic forces. It was evidently because of Ambedkar that the radical anti-caste groups such as Dalit Panthers subsequently fought against the high caste establishments and dominant power structures in post- independence India. The Dalit Panthers not only organised Dalits to protest against caste, class and gender-based disparities but also encouraged Dalit literary production which began sporadically in the 1950s in some regions of India.

EMERGENCE, GROWTH and proliferation of Dalit literature is one of the most significant events of the twentieth century. Dalit literature is an awakened and collective response from Dalits to their social segregation, economic deprivation. Political marginalisation, religio-cultural stigmatisation, and all forms of exploitation unleashed on them over the centuries. Dalit writers have used literature to induce caste and class consciousness among impoverished Dalits and to mobilise them against the hegemonic socio-economic forces that possess unrestrained social privileges and also control economic resources. Dalit literature voices a systematic rebellion against the long preserved system of caste that exploited and promoted numerous discernments against them. The precept of caste denies them basic humanity and subjects them to an unending, unbridled thraldom to the high castes who humiliate and exploit them in numerous ways on account of their caste and economic vulnerability. Examining the implications of caste in Dalit lives, Arjun Dangle writes, "The living conditions of these untouchables were shameful. They had no land to till nor could they follow any profession. They did menial work ordered by the high castes. Treated like animals, they lived apart from the village, and had to accept leftovers from the high caste people, in return for their endless toil." (Introduction xxi) They were usually asked to live with waste and filth near cremation grounds or on the margins of villages. This was a deliberate onslaught on their integrity and dignity. Caste also imposed many behavioural restrictions. Assertion of personhood and expression of will and desire was strictly prohibited and they were made to behave submissively or in a way that indicated their Dalitness and subordination. They were not allowed to wear new clothes, ornaments or footwear, rags or clothes removed from corpses were the only dresses they were allowed to wear. Dalit autobiographies such as Daya Pawar's Baluta, Baby Kamble's The Prisons We Broke, Urmila Pawar's The Weave of My Life, Limbale's The Outcaste, and Byapari's Interrogating My Chandal Life among others show how casteist forces colonised Dalit bodies and violated their human rights. Poor lifestyle and filthy, untidy appearance were the imperative religious sanctions for them. Caste also accounted (and still accounts) for gender oppression as it interacted with patriarchy and exposed women to certain oppressions and prohibitions. Dalit literature exposes how caste operates in Dalit lives and interacts with other repressive ideologies such as religion, class and gender. It condemns every form of exploitation that Dalits are subjected to.