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Dalits Convert to Islam, Buddhism And Christianity
Over a hundred Dalits (low-caste Hindus) converted to Buddhism, Islam and Christianity, Sunday, October 27, in protest against the inequality in Hindu religion, which treats Dalits as sub-human, even less important than cattle. The new converts included families of the five Dalits lynched on October 15 for skinning a dead cow. For hundreds of generations these people have been skinning dead animals. High-caste Hindus worship the cow as âmother,â and are generally anti-cow slaughter. However, they have traditionally allowed skinning of dead animals, including cows, and their trade. On October 15, a mob of 2000 upper caste Hindus lynched five Dalit young men for having âkilledâ a cow barely 60 kilometres from the national capital as 50 policemen and senior government officials watched silently. Families of victims say that their relatives were actually killed by the police for refusing to pay high bribes. The latest round of conversions has come in response to that event.And with good reason... Dalits are aggrieved not only about the continuing harassment and humiliation at the hands of high-caste Hindus, but by the justification of such harassment by religious leaders. Soon after the lynching, a high-profile Hindu religious leader, Giriraj Kishore, told newspersons in Delhi that as per Hindu scriptures, âthe life of a cow is more precious than a manâs.â That's a nice little reminder that ignorance and brutality aren't the exclusive province of Islamism. I always found it interesting that the "export version" of Hinduism, being closer to the Vedic forms, didn't include the caste system. It managed to flourish for several hundred years alongside Lesser Vehicle Buddhism in Cambodia, large parts of what's now Indonesia, Champa (southern Vietnam) and a few other places. If the Indos are going to do real "Hinduvta," maybe they should scrub the caste system â which is, after all, a relatively recent development in their religion. Dalit leader Udit Raj, himself a convert from Hinduism to Buddhism, said Sunday that Hindu religious and ultra nationalist organizations like âthe VHP, Bajrang Dal and RSS and their so-called leaders are forcing the Dalits across the country to convert to different religionsâ. He said that the guilty had been allowed to go scot-free which meant that the government was anti-Dalit. And he's probably right. The Hinduvta bunch is trying to pass laws making it illegal proselytize other religions, and if they manage that they'll try to make it illegal to convert. That's the sign of a religion on the decline, not resurgent. Posted by: Fred Pruitt 2002-10-28 |
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