Power-hungry dalit political leaders are blind to dalit issues: Dalit intelligentsia

Chennai:

The dalit intelligentsia slammed the dalit politicians for betraying the community  by ignoring the basic rights of the scheduled castes and scheduled tribes.

At a meeting organized to discuss the ‘Current problems of Scheduled castes and Scheduled Tribes’ at the Dr Ambedkar Academy, the intelligentisia, which comprised of bureacrats, academicians, social activists and people from different walks of life, expressed concern that even after 63 years of independence nothing has changed for the community.

“Now we have political rights as all the states do have Scheduled Caste MLAs and  MPs. But these MPs are hankering for power and using the community as a ladder and in the process ignoring the basic rights of the community,” said former chief secretary of the state and advisor of Dr Ambedkar Academy Dr A Padmanaban.

“The dalit parties are more bothered about seat sharing but hardly have they voiced the need to abolish untouchability in the state,” the former governor of Mizoram said.

Padmanaban also hit out at the SC & ST commission which barely acknowledges the letters of the dalits highlighting their problem. He said all the political parties have paid only lip services to the plight of the downtrodden community. “The Congress party in their earlier poll manifesto , the Common Minimum Programme has promised lot of things for the dalits and they failed to live up to it. Even Chief minister M Karunanidhi has promised a lot for the community but nothing has been achieved,” he said.

He also said the assurances by the private sector to provide jobs for dalits have  seldom been implemented. He hoped the recent assurances by former bureaucrat and FICCI advisor P Murari would be brought to action.

Padmanaban was also critical of the committee appointed to study the panchami land issue. “They have to submit the report in six months and till now they had only two sittings. With the elections around, I think it is highly unlikely they would be able to submit the report by the given deadline,” he added.

Former bureaucrat C Chellappan voiced concern over the denial of rights to dalit panchayat presidents. “We have to work for selecting dalit panchayat candidates who know about their rights,” he said.

He also voiced concern over delay over allocation of funds to Tamil Nadu Adi Dravidar Housing Development Corporation. “How will the dalit students get quality training,” he added.

S Devadoss, director, National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT), Chennai and Chellapan also highlighted the need for more hostels for the dalit students besides doing away with capitation fee for dalits in the private institutions.