Dalit Christians in Bihar have set up a forum to promote their distinct identity and interests. The eastern Indian state has about 100,000 Dalit Christians who live in remote villages, says Gabriel John, who founded Bihar Dalit Christian Sabha (assembly). Dalit in Sanskrit means "broken" and denotes people from groups once labelled "untouchable" at the bottom of India's traditional caste system.

John, a retired government worker, says Dalit converts to Christianity remain "the weakest" in society. Although Christianity does not sanction the caste system, he explained, upper-caste Hindus nevertheless refuse to distinguish "between us and fellow Hindu Dalit."

The new forum "actually marks our struggle for justice and recognition," John says. Its formal launch took place on 23 December 2007 in Patna, the state capital, 1,015 km east of New Delhi.

According to John, Bihar's Dalit Christians are scattered in 600 villages served by Patna archdiocese and Buxar, Bhagalpur and Purnea dioceses. Some villages have only three or four Dalit Christian families.

While they continue to suffer the same social and cultural hardships faced by their Hindu counterparts, the forum convener says the bigger problem is their "constitutional deprivation." The Indian Constitution provides education and reserves jobs for Dalit to help their social and economic advancement. But Christian and Muslim Dalit are denied these benefits on the ground that their religions do not formally recognize the caste system.

"We are Christians and so shorn of the caste stigma, while remaining untouchables in the eyes of society," John laments. A Dalit Hindu can file a case if an upper-caste man insults him on account of his low caste. Indian law provides a three-year jail sentence for this. Christians, however, have no such protection, since legally they are not recognized as Dalit.

Amrit Lal, a Christian Dalit youth, credits the Church with helping educate his people but says they cannot progress because they can find few jobs.

Some Dalit Christians make use of the government's reservation of jobs for Dalit by technically declaring themselves Hindus, even though "they are thoroughly devout Christians," the youth acknowledges. But they fear being caught, dismissed from their jobs and even jailed, he adds.

Lal, a member of the new forum, says his people would join Dalit Christians and Muslims in other parts of the country to end discrimination against them. They also would try "to foster a sense of unity and togetherness" among Dalit Christians, who form the majority of Christians in Bihar. The forum would undertake an intensive networking and interaction among Dalit Christians, he adds.

"We are sure this would facilitate the building up of our distinct identity and send a message that though we are scattered, we are in ... solidarity," Lal asserts. Such a move, he continues, would "gradually give a voice to even the weakest and most numerically insignificant Dalit Christians in remote villages."

Nageshwar Das, another forum activist, is sceptical of the government granting Dalit Christians constitutional benefits. Such a goal is "a mirage," because Hindu Dalit leaders "would not relish us having a bite of their privileges cake," he says. "Their support for our cause is simply an eye wash," Das says. He suggests his people should strive to preserve "our cultural ethos, which is both Dalit and Christian."

Das says other Christian groups have their associations to promote their cultural and social goals but seldom invite their Dalit brethren to meetings. "Dalit Hindus refuse to consider us part of their fraternity because of our Christian faith, (and other) Christians refuse to treat us as their brethren in faith because of our different cultural and ethnic moorings," he explains. "So forming our own association ... was the ultimate way out."

John wants the local Church to follow its counterpart in the southern state of Tamil Nadu by reserving special quotas for Dalit children in its schools and jobs for Dalit youths in its institutions.

The forum, he says, will launch a campaign for such remedial measures on 4 February 2007, the feast day of the state's leading Marian shrine. Thousands of Dalit Christians attend the annual feast in Mokameh, 60 km east of Patna.

Prabodh Kumar, a Dalit Christian, saya the community has retained all local folk cultural rituals and ceremonies associated with birth, marriage and death while remaining steadfast in their Christian faith. This will enable the new organization to present "an inculturated face" of the local Church, which he asserts would help the Church dispel its foreign image.

(Source: Indian Catholic)