'National Dalit Movement for Justice (NDMJ), headquartered in New Delhi, has released a detailed report on increasing human rights violation cases against Dalits, Adivasis and other marginalized communities of India during COVID-19 lockdown. In April and May alone during the nationwide lockdown, NDMJ and SASY intervened in 67 cases of caste and gender-based violence, the nature of these cases revealing layered untouchability through socio-economic boycott and physical assault as the main cause.
'A five-year-old Dalit child allegedly died of hunger in Jharkhand’s Latehar district on May 16. Her father, a brick-kiln worker, said he had not been earned any wages during the lockdown. Video testimonies released by activists who visited the child’s home in Hesatu village, show family members, neighbours and community health workers attributing Nimani’s death to hunger. “She died of hunger,” the child’s mother, Kamlawati, can be heard saying in one of the videos. “She had not eaten for four-five days. What can we eat when there is nothing to eat?”...'
'A assistant sub-inspector deputed at Mumbai’s National Investigation Agency (NIA) has tested positive for COVID-19, the department informed the special NIA court on Saturday, April 25, while opposing the interim bail application filed by academic and civil rights activist Anand Teltumbde who was arrested on April 14 amid the rapidly spreading COVID-19 virus in the country. Despite the NIA’s disclosure that an officer was infected, a special NIA court rejected Teltumbde’s interim bail application and sent him to judicial custody for 14 days.
'It is 7AM in the morning. The roads are empty. Beside a clogged sewer, a man in his 50s holding a long rod changes to his uniform— a pair of torn shirt and trousers. Rajan*, a sanitation worker in the “Second Best” realty city of India, goes down the sewer everyday with nothing but a rod and a handkerchief on his face. The foul smell emerges from the deep sewer and soon his whole body is covered in black fluid which is the toilet waste of the nearby high class housing societies. He opens the lid of the manhole he is about to crawl into.
'A 24-year-old man was killed in his village in the Tiruvannamalai district of Tamil Nadu amidst the nationwide lockdown for allegedly marrying outside his caste. According to a report in the Frontline, M. Sudhakar from the Morappan Thangal village belonged to the Oddar caste and had returned to his village from Chennai after the lockdown owing to fears surrounding the outbreak of the novel coronavirus. After returning to his village, he attempted to meet his wife which angered the women’s parents and relatives...'
'Even as the total number of the people testing positive for COVID-19 rose to 335 in Uttar Pradesh (UP) , in the first such case all over the country, a Dalit youth committed suicide on Wednesday after he was allegedly beaten up by the UP police for breaking quarantine rules. A resident of Fariya Pipariya village which falls in Lakhimpur district, the Dalit youth, Roshan Lal worked as a daily wage worker in Gurugam...'
'An 11-year-old Dalit boy died of hunger at Mushahar Tola in Bihar’s Ara district on March 27, claimed a report put out by the CPI(ML). The report sought to link the alleged hunger death to the ongoing nationwide lockdown to contain the spread of coronavirus. Although district officials claimed they were not aware of any such incident, a press release quoting CPI(ML) state secretary Kunal said the body died due to starvation. Kavita Krishnan, a Left-leaning human rights activist, tweeted about the incident on Saturday, alleging that the boy had been starving because of the lockdown...'
'The journalist who wrote about members of the Musahar community eating grass in villages around the prime minister’s parliamentary constituency Varanasi has been served a notice by the district administration for spreading misinformation. Vijay Vineet, news editor of Jansandesh time, a 16-page newspaper which has five editions in the state, had filed a report with his colleague Manish Mishra about families in Koiripur village (Baragaon block) subsisting on the grass on March 26. The report was accompanied by pictures of children eating grass.
'Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday announced a complete lockdown of the country for a period of twenty-one days. All work, except that of essential service providers, is to be stopped. Daily wage workers nationwide are suffering under the lockdown because of the nature of their work. Hunger and poverty are looming over their heads. The prime minister’s Lok Sabha constituency, Varanasi, is no exception. On Wednesday, a group of children were seen sitting cross-legged and eating grass, called “akri” in the local language.
'In his new book, Sebastian & Sons, TM Krishna tells of Parlandu, the “greatest mrdangam maker ever”. Parlandu was Dalit, as all makers of the mrdangam, a percussion instrument made with cow hide which is integral to Carnatic music, are. He was employed by Vaidyanatha Ayyar and, later, by his legendary pupil, the revered Carnatic musician Palghat Mani Iyer. Both teacher and disciple, as almost all mrdangam players, were Brahmin.
