`Civilised' people don't talk about caste

`Civilised' people don't talk about caste

Poor Suhel Seth (`Forgive me, for I drink rum' November 5). After `Dalits walked into an evening of The Gin Drinkers' (by Chandra Bhan Prasad, IE, November 2), he had to call his mother to ask which caste he belonged to. He says sadly that Chandra Bhan made him think of caste when it was never an issue. "Was that right?" he demands.

No, it wasn't. It was unethical and unforgivable of Chandra Bhan. Lucky, lucky Chandra Bhan, who has had to know and remember his caste from the moment he was born, whose caste identity has been branded into his soul with every breath he has taken -- how insensitive of him to embarrass others less fortunate. Really, Suhel Seth -- wake up and clear the rosy mist from the windows of your privileged citadel. "Civilised" people don't need to ask people their caste before inviting them to dinner. Do you really believe that people's caste identities have to be ascertained by a CBI probe? Or that editors have to "do a castecheck" before hiring? Your caste hangs from your name -- how ignorant do you have to be not to know that? Or rather, how privileged? You have never had to know who you are because your name proudly flies like a banner before you -- no space was ever barred to you, nothing ever prohibited. Do you know or care that in small towns even today, there are public places -- restaurants, dhabas -- wherenon-Dalits cannot go with their Dalit friends? Does it seem to you purely accidental that your social circle and those of others like us, is so amazingly homogeneous in terms of religious, caste and of course, class identity? Our lives are already structured so that we hardly ever encounter those who are Not Like Us -- we never have to ask who they are, our friends, for they are most probably mirror images of ourselves.

The people present at the book reading were there because "they have made it in life on their own", you say, not because of their caste. Look at the homogeneity of those who occupy the overwhelming majority of the top bureaucracy, the top corporate jobs, professor-level posts in universities, top positions in the media. Pure coincidence? Or would you argue that it's simply because "merit" happens to reside mainly in upper caste Hindu men? ("It doesn't?" I hear you exclaim in surprise.)

Any feminist would at some time or the other have encountered the man who says indulgently, "Why do you keep saying you are a woman? I don't keep thinking I am a man. We are all human after all." And we are struck dumb with envy -- for of course, only the extremely privileged can afford to forget that they occupy specific bodies, specific stations in life, have access to specific privileges, all accorded to them from birth. That indulgent male only has to get into my body and take two steps from his gate to be forcibly reminded what his sex is. As every woman is, every moment of her life.

No one who has not read the book would realise from Suhel Seth's piece that there is a prominent character in the novel who is a Dalit intellectual. For he says, "The Gin Drinkers is about the gin drinkers...It's not about the Dalits of India." Indeed. Everything is always about you, isn't it? This book, all books, the nation itself. "It's about Us. Not about You."

Sweet reasonableness is the privilege of the powerful, my friend. You can speak softly if you carry a big stick. The rest have to shout. And you know what? Today you have no choice but to listen.