Caste: Still a hot topic

Justice Vinubhai H Bhairavia, former judge, High Court of Bombay, has just published Journey to Freedom: Still Miles, Miles to Go (Jain Book Agency, Rs 400). It comes with praise from Justice V R Krishna Iyer and renowned jurist Ram Jethmalani.

“I have known the author as a struggling lawyer,” writes Jethmalani, “then a fairly successful one, a government pleader, an agitator for social justice, a Judge with pronounced activism on the Bench and a perennial commitment to the cause of the downtrodden.”

It reads like an autobiography, but is interesting more for the comments it makes on India’s Dalits. The author was born in a poor Dalit family and rose, against all odds, to the position he occupies today. With his own story as a backdrop, the book traces the development of Dalits in Independent India. “Casteism in the Hindu community is the root-cause of the caste-based backwardness of 82 per cent of the population of our country,” reads the Preface.

Despite schedules castes and tribes comprising 22 per cent of India's population, the surprise is the astonishingly low percentage of Dalits who manage to play any significant role in the judicial system. A number of chapters discuss casteism in detail, with the author pointing out that there are no short cuts to Dalit liberation. These are interesting insights, coming as they are in the aftermath of nationwide protests against reservations.

Justice Bhairavia could have paid more attention to language (the Contents page has one chapter titled 'A stunning massage' instead of 'message'), but there are important issues being raised here if one can look beyond the grammar.

For another perspective on India's backward classes, you might want to pick up Arun Shourie’s Falling Over Backwards: An essay against Reservations and against Judicial populism (Rupa & Co. Rs 495). Its release may be a well-calculated move, as the Minister documents what he describes as attempts by state legislatures and Parliament to bend the law for their own benefit. He also says the courts have been virtually ineffective in tackling arbitrary government functioning.

Clearly, this chapter on caste is far from over.