Dalit Rights/Human Rights

Contents: Acknowledgement. 1. The global human rights discourse. 2. The Indian social scenario. 3. Dalits in contemporary India. 4. Dalit working children: whither human rights? 5. Dalit women and human rights concerns. 6. Religious conversion and human rights: Dalit converts as victims of caste oppression. 7. Dalits, displacement and human rights. 8. Dalit struggles for social justice: a historical overview. 9. Dalit struggles for human rights at the international fora. 10. Concluding observations. Appendices. Bibliography. Index.

Socially stigmatized, culturally subjugated and politically marginalized, dalits have been the most vulnerable community in terms of human rights violations in India.

The book makes a concerted effort to explore the roots of the vulnerability and the present status of this section of the society against the backdrop of the changing social, economic and political scenario. In particular, it examines the vulnerability of dalit women, children and those who are victims of displacement. It also looks into the compulsions under which the dalits have opted for conversion and their post-conversion status.

The book thus seeks to cover the entire spectrum of the rights situation of the dalits in India, the negation of their rights as also their struggles, placing the discussion in the wider context of globalization and the unfolding global human rights discourse since the 1990s.