Church in the World

Lay forum speaks up for Dalits

India

The All India Catholic Union - a national lay network - has urged the federal Government not to restrict its concern for marginalised minorities to Muslims.

"This development process must not be confined only to politically powerful minorities, but must also focus on the Christian community, which is as poor and underdeveloped as Muslims but has no electoral clout," said John Dayal, AICU national president, on Monday.

His call followed Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's address to the National Development Council last Saturday in which he said, "We will have to devise innovative plans to ensure that minorities, particularly the Muslim minority, are empowered to share equitably the fruits of development. These must have the first claim on resources."

While welcoming the concern expressed by the Indian Prime Minister for the Muslims who account for 13 per cent of India's 1.1 billion population and remain one of the country's poorest communities, Mr Dayal told The Tablet on Tuesday that the plight of oppressed Christian Dalits (formerly "untouchables") was "no different".

While Hindu, Buddhist and Sikh Dalits are entitled to free education and a quota of government jobs to improve their social status, these rights are denied to Muslim and Christian Dalits, who account for two-thirds of the 27 million Christians in India. The Hindu nationalist lobby fears that conceding equal rights would result in the mass conversion of Hindu Dalits to Christianity.