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CHOTILA, INDIA, December 15, 2003: At least seven Dalit (Untouchables) teachers have been transferred in Gujarat’s Surendranagar district for objecting to segregation of upper and lower-caste students during mid-day meals in some schools. Now upper-caste parents in other villages are using the threat of transfer to keep Dalit teachers from opposing the practice, reports this article. “During training, we are taught to treat every student the same irrespective of caste or religion, but here it is not so,” said Girishbhai Wadher, a Dalit headmaster who was transferred from the primary school in Bhojpari village to one in Mehindad, and then to one in Kabran. Wadher said the discrimination was not so rampant or visible when he joined three years ago. “In August some upper-caste parents in Bhojpari and Bhojpara villages asked the mid-day meals in-charge to make Dalit students sit separately,” he said. “When two other teachers and I protested, the villagers came and told us they would socially boycott the entire Dalit community in the village.” DPEO P. F. Pargi, who acknowledged that Wadher had complained to him, said that this was only a temporary arrangement “till things cooled down.” He said: “We cannot afford to have 200 students not attending school because of such a problem.” “Therefore, the only solution was to shift the teachers temporarily,” he said. “I think the issue has been solved for now.” Asked what he was doing about the segregation of Dalits and non-Dalits, Pargi had no answer. Many Dalit teachers feel the Social Justice & Empowerment department hasn’t taken the matter with the seriousness it deserves.

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