“In one violent confrontation in Jhaloor, when protestors gathered for a night rally, drunk and armed Jutts ambushed over 100 Dalit villagers, and even threatened them, saying, “We’ll teach your daughters a lesson for asking for land,” according to Kaur, who was in the rally. Houses were vandalised; women, children, and animals were attacked. An elderly Dalit woman, Mata Gurudev Kaur, eventually died after her leg was almost severed with an axe” (Soumya). This all happened when I was doing my graduation from Punjabi university Patiala in 2014, in a nearby district Sangrur. This was an incident where I saw caste and patriarchy in close alliance.
This incident was not a surprising thing for me as from my subject position have witnessed to different kind of structural violence against women and dalit community. I come from a rural area of Punjab where “upper castes, mostly Jat Sikhs, dominate the farming landscape. Only 3.5% of private farm land belongs to Dalits who make up 32% of the population, according to the Agriculture Census of 2015-16. The national average is 8.6% of farm land for 16.6% of Dalits” (Moudgil).
Women have witnessed various kinds of violence in their daily life in rural Punjab, “Women would be in tears narrating their experiences of how upper caste men would feel entitled over lower caste women. Particularly when they go out to get fodder, being abused is not at all an extraordinary thing; it is part of everyday life” (Soumya).
Dalit women in Punjab have raised their voice for equal redistribution of economic and social wealth and have a long history from pre-independence to present day times. “In the course of history the Dalit Community has been denied fundamental rights and marginalized leaving no stone unturned. In 1961, the state passed the Punjab Village Common Lands (Regulation) Act, reserving 33% of agricultural village common land for Scheduled castes, who could get an annual lease through bidding. Rules under the statute were framed in 1964. The implementation, however, was indifferent. The 1961 land regulation act carved out 1/3rd panchayat land rights for al dalit families. Their rights have existed only on paper with ruling parties patronizing all steps of ruling castes to deny the dalits their promised rights” (Thakor et al.).
“Most Dalit men in the villages go out to work as daily wage labourers in construction, or have petty trades in towns nearby, and do not engage in caste occupations. It is women who bring fodder from the fields, work as harvesters, and do domestic chores. This regularly brings them in direct contact with upper caste people” (Soumya).
In the 2014 the Dalit women in Punjab under ZPSC (Zameen Prapti Sangharsh Commitee) have emerged as a upsurge or emancipation of the dalit community of Punjab from enslavement in the struggle of Dalit agricultural labour. ZPSC mainly focussed on the issue of the Dalit Community winning it’s share of 1/3rd share of promised Panchayat land (Thakor et al.). It advocates for a 33year land lease for the dalit Community to replace annual auctioning where dalits were manipulated. The ZPSC is fighting for better socio-economic conditions in terms of land relations, wages paid to dalit workers, condition of women and employment.
Works Cited
- Majumder, Sourya. “’Punjab Dalit Groups Supported The Farm Protests. The Ordinary Dalit Did Not.’ — Article 14.” Article 14, 28 December 2021, https://www.article-14.com/post/-punjab-dalit-groups-supported-the-farm-protests-the-ordinary-dalit-did-not–61ca852818c48. Accessed 11 March 2022.
- Moudgil, Manu. “Fist For Farm: How Punjab’s Dalits Are Fighting For Their Right Over Common Land.” IndiaSpend, 7 August 2019, https://www.indiaspend.com/fist-for-farm-how-punjabs-dalits-are-fighting-for-their-right-over-common-land/. Accessed 11 March 2022.
- Thakor, Harsh, et al. “Zameen Prapti Sangharsh Commitee Led Movement In Punjab-A Turning Point In Revolutionary History Of Punjab And India.” Countercurrents, 20 September 2020, https://countercurrents.org/2020/09/zameen-prapti-sangharsh-commitee-led-movement-in-punjab-a-turning-point-in-revolutionary-history-of-punjab-and-india/. Accessed 11 March 2022.
- Soumya, Elizabeth. “How Dalit People are Reclaiming Land in Punjab.” The Blueprint.News, 31 July 2020, https://theblueprint.news/news/2020/07/how-dalit-people-are-reclaiming-land-in-punjab/. Accessed 21 March 2022.