Violence Against Dalit Women

But Dalit women, treated as ‘last person in the society’ are the most vulnerable because they face the triple burden of caste, class, and gender. They face untouchability, discrimination and violence much more than their male counterparts. Violence on Dalit women by the dominant caste communities reveals the “world view” as inferior, impure, of low character, easily available and accessible. Being a Dalit woman, abuse is used to remind her of her caste and keep her oppressed. Not only their performance with regard to human development indicators are much lower compared to their counterpart from rest of the women, also the instances of atrocities are far higher than non-Dalit women.

Physical assault, verbal abuse, sexual harassment, rape,

Therefore, now the time when India is rising as star on the world stage, we all committed to human rights and principles of justice, equality, liberty, fraternity must not allow Indian Government to ignore the injustice and oppression against Dalits and Dalit women in particular any longer. Also India is a democracy and is a Party to most of the major human rights treaties. These treaties provide the same rights for men and for women. Because India is also a Party to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), the Government has an extra obligation to make sure that women can realise their human rights (www.rightlivelihood.org/fileadmin/.../Background_Manorama.pdf).Government should step ahead to erase its deep-rooted caste-mentality and to properly enforce its laws, implement its policies, and fulfill its responsibility to protect the basic human rights of ALL of its citizens (http://www.ncdhr.org.in/Dalit-rights-situation). It is absolutely necessary that common people need to be sensitized about the prevailing atrocities against Dalit women. There is a growing need to capture violation of human rights of Dalit women, so that talent and potential of Dalit Women can be used for development of