Tag: caste

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Poem: In tolerant India

Yes, I’m a racist.
I look at you and see
The percentage of melanin
In your skin
The angle your eyes slant
The colour of the iris
The length of your hair
It’s texture
It’s shape
It’s smell
The way it shines
Or not.

Yes, I’m a casteist.
I look at your surname and your name
Your tilak and your birth fame
The clothes you wear
The accent you talk
The scrawls on your certificate
What’s on your plate
The smells
The shape
Of the food you just ate
Or didn’t.

racism, caste in India

Yes, I’m tolerant
I tolerate you
Smile at you
Accept you
Hiding disgust
That rises inside.
You’re my responsibility
Part of my culture
My country
My people to empower
And I will
I promise I will
Even though the percentage
And the texture and shape
Remind me of rape.

Is it my fault?
Your hands are so dark
And dirty
They’ve touched the filth
My ancestors did
.

Your birth certificate
It’s barely there
Torn and soiled
Like a drain.

You speak weird
Unpolished and poor
Your dark skin
Reminds me of
Monsters and their kin

Is it my fault?

I’m trying hard
To power you up
To empower you
But the skin
It’s so dark
So dark.

Can I help but judge?

Is it my fault
If your skin is so dull?
Can I help but judge you?

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The problem I have with Census 2011

The Census lady just visited my house in Delhi with her long list of questions. With every question, I felt more and more disconnected with our government’s thinking and also angry. In their need to compartmentalize our beautifully diverse population, the government is killing our multiplicity—or wants to. You will be forcefully put in one compartment or the other and sadly have no choice about the matter. Here’s what five minutes of interacting with the census lady told me. Be prepared for a mental onslaught when the Census probe comes knocking by your door!

  1. The census begins by asking you who is the HEAD of the family section—which of course is assumed to be a man. I wonder what happens in the household with only women? All the other people living in the house are made relatives of the said ‘Head’ of the family. How can a government which is talking about Women equality and creating bills and laws to protect its women be so patriarchal in its forms? I always had a problem with the forms which asked Father/Husband only – as if a woman cannot exist alone. Always made by a male babu of course.
  2. The next question is RELIGION with six choices – Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, Christian, Jain and Buddhist. If you don’t have a religion, I am sorry but you cannot exist for our dear government.

    Boxed in by your caste
  3. The major issue which a lot of us coffee-house argumentative so-called-intellectuals have been talking about since months is the fact that we don’t want to give out our CASTE. We always hoped (without any action of course) that the government will be sensible enough to give us a choice of NO CASTE. That’s the third question and no, before you ask me, you don’t have a choice of saying NO CASTE. If you say so, the census lady will simply have to put one you depending on your mother tongue. You have to belong to a CASTE else you simply don’t exist for the votes that the government in power needs.

After these three initial questions, I was too emotional (and too scared) to read more of the census questions. It’s unfortunate when you start to see our government deliberately chopping our diverse society into cubes of castes. Our freedom fighters and social reformers must be turning in their graves. This is their nightmare come true.