-The Times of India The UP government on Friday scrapped former CM Mayawati's projects for dalits and those named after their icons. The money allocated for such projects would be diverted to fulfill poll promises like Rs 1,000 monthly allowance for unemployed youth, pension to farmers above 65 besides laptops and PC tablets for students. Sources said the attempt was to ensure that welfare schemes benefit every section of the society and not...

New census data on asset ownership among different social groups has shown that a far higher proportion of scheduled castes and higher still of scheduled tribes do not own basic consumer durables like a phone or bicycle as compared to "others". Three states however buck this trend; across caste groupings in Punjab, Kerala and Tamil Nadu, the rate of ownership of basic consumer durables is high. In fact, the asset ownership...

dalits, OBCs in India’s colleges are using beef as a symbol of a resurgent identity     “Non-Brahmins have evidently undergone a revolution. From being beef-eaters to have become non-beef-eaters was indeed a revolution. But if non-Brahmins underwent one revolution, Brahmins had undergone two. They gave up beef-eating, which was one revolution. To have given up meat-eating altogether and become vegetarians was another revolution.”     —B.R. Ambedkar *** The Beef Menu     Available In Kerala,...

Makhdumpur is a village in Uttar Pradesh's Bhadohi district. Adjoining it is a cluster of huts inhabited by people of the Nat caste, one of the lowest among dalits. Congress party general secretary Rahul Gandhi visited a hut in the settlement just before the recent State Assembly elections. He spent some time inside the hut, interacted with the residents, shared a meal with them and then went on his way....

Rajasthan has emerged as the state with the highest incidence of registered atrocities against dalits across the country. In 2010, the state recorded 51.4 cases of atrocities against dalits per lakh population under the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes Prevention of Atrocities Act. It had registered a similar number of cases in 2009 too. The latest data from the ministry of social justice and empowerment show that five states – Uttar...