AZAMGARH DISTRICT, INDIA, September 1, 2008: When Chandra Bhan Prasad visits his ancestral village in these feudal badlands of northern India, he dispenses the following advice to his fellow dalits: Get rid of things that demand children’s labor. Invest in your children’s education instead of in jewelry or land. Cities are good for outcastes like us, and so is India’s new capitalism.
The last 17 years of new capitalism have already allowed the dalits to “escape hunger and humiliation,” he says, if not residual prejudice. Now, at a time of tremendous change in India, Mr. Prasad is a lightning rod for one of the country’s most wrenching debates: If India’s embrace of economic reforms really uplifted its people. He is conducting a qualitative survey of nearly 20,000 households here in northern state of Uttar Pradesh to measure how everyday life has changed for dalits since economic liberalization began in 1991. The preliminary findings reveal subtle shifts. Today Ddalits are far less likely to be engaged in their traditional occupations and more likely to enjoy social life.