Outcast Scholar Casteless Human

This online lecture was delivered on September 21, 2020, to the students of MA in Social Work at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai. This episode will give you a brief overview about Dalits in South Asia.  

Dr Umakant is an independent scholar based in New Delhi. He has been actively engaged with dalit and caste related issues as a scholar and a social activist for over two decades.

"The pernicious influences of the caste system exist in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka. This has made it acquire a typical South Asian character, affecting a Dalit population of about 260 million in varying degrees and magnitudes. The caste system and its characteristics, contributing to the worst forms of discrimination, exclusion and violence, though considered taboo on some levels, are still practiced in several overt and covert ways in all of South Asia. Besides, no one should be under the illusion that the caste system has affected and is practiced only among the Hindus. On the contrary, this virus has made an intrusion into Islam, Christianity and all the other religions that exist in South Asia." - Dr Umakant

Host : Dr. Shailesh Kumar Darokar

Lecturer : Dr. Umakant



A Corrigendum: I would like to sincerely tender an apology for wrongly mentioning in my lecture that Dr. B R Ambedkar was elected to the Constituent Assembly of India from Sylhet. As a matter of fact, he was elected from undivided Bengal (Jessore-Khulna Constituency) which is currently in Bangladesh. You could read an interesting article on this issue (Ambedkar’s odyssey to the Constituent Assembly of India through Bengal) – Umakant, New Delhi.