Dalit kids: “Untouchables” and uneducated too (Times of India)
“Dalit children at a school in Jagatsinghpur district do not know where they went wrong with their studies because teachers refused to check their notebooks. ‘Ame achuta (We are considered untouchables). The teachers refuse to touch our books and our homework is never corrected,’ said Bijaya Mallick, a student of Class IV at the school at Keutapala in Balikuda block. ‘If we even touch our teachers by mistake, they scold us for polluting them,’ he added.
“The 40 odd Dalit students in the school were allegedly singled out and made to clean classrooms and toilets. ‘I clean toilets at school,’ said Samir Mallick, a Class V student. He looked puzzled when asked why he agreed to do so. ‘The teachers tell me to do it,’ the 11-year-old boy said. ‘We are not even allowed to take water from the drinking pot at school,’ he added.
“Several students and their parents complained that they were victims of caste discrimination by the school staff since long. The final straw, however, was when teachers refused to serve mid-day meals to the children. This prompted incensed parents not to send their wards to school for the past one week.”
See also:
Dalit school children prevented to take mid-day meal with upper-caste students (OrissaDiary, May 2, 2011)
And see anti-caste: SEGREGATED AND HUMILIATED IN THE CLASSROOM (November 28, 2009), REPORT ON CASTE-BASED DISCRIMINATION IN SCHOOLS (June 25, 2009), and CASTE BIGOTRY IN INDIAN SCHOOLS GOES UNPUNISHED (September 27, 2008)
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