Indian school of ostracism

Mebin Vargheese
Jul 24, 2017 · 2 min read

India is one of the fastest growing economies in the world. At this pace, nothing stands in her way, and there has been a paradigm shift in her cultural sphere. The emergence of new cities created spaces with composite culture. But, it’s a different story in the villages where more than 70% of her population resides. Caste and sub-caste rules over the villages in most of the states. They form informal village councils and takes decision irrationally, in most of the cases the victim will be forced to leave his ancestor property or will be boycotted in the society.

After her independence in the mid 20th century, India started growing tremendously. But, everyone was silent about a new social classification of individuals in the name of caste and unpopular traditions which were mostly created in the near future. The rules and blockages depend in the community to which the person belongs to. In most of the cases, the elected government acts as an ordinary viewer, taking advantage of the situation or playing vote-bank politics. The end effect of this play is quite a shame to the culturally rich India and her endeavors. Most people in the lower sections of the society are richly affected by this huge whale, followed by unemployment or crop loss.

But things started changing in a while, Maharashtra who is the biggest contributor in terms of state wise GDP has passed a landmark legislation against the odds of social isolation of individuals or communities. Recently the bill made it through the state legislature then, receiving Presidential Assent and finally MAHARASHTRA PROTECTION OF PEOPLE FROM SOCIAL BOYCOTT (Prevention, Prohibition, and Redressal) Act 2016 came to light. It prohibits range from preventing the performance of a social or religious custom, denial of rights to perform funerals or marriages and importantly providing equal access to education and medical institutions.

It’s a progressive law meant to end the ills of caste related local politics and social stigma which is well rooted in the Indian society.

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