Sunday, May 4, 2003		Lead Article

Temple or gurdwara, caste is the bar
Jangveer Singh

THE villages of Punjab may be known for their lassi, sarson da saag and even ghar di kadi hoyi sharab but behind this facade is also a well-known truth which is less publicised. Casteism, instead of losing ground in a liberal and modern society, is threatening to cast it’s shadow over equations between Jats, the land-owning farmers, and the Dalits, who labour in their fields.

Last year, The Tribune had highlighted how Dalits were being denied entry into the shrine of Bal Jati at Rakhra village near here. The managers of the shrine made announcements during worship hours that Scheduled Castes should not enter the temple. There was also protest from Dalit organisations against the discriminatory practice and they demanded a probe into the matter. The matter died down with officials visiting the shrine which houses the samadhi of Baba Bal Jati and asking its management not to make such announcements. The discrimination, however, continues.

Recently, The Tribune again highlighted the manner in which Dalits were discriminated against by not being allowed to pay their obeisance at the shrine of Baba Bhola Nath at Mandaur village, 17 km from Patiala.

A visit to the shrine revealed that the discrimination persists. Two youngsters, who were managing the affairs of the shrine as the mahant slept, candidly admitted that Dalits were not allowed to pay obeisance at the temple. The youngsters even disclosed that earlier an old man was a regular visitor to the temple and took away the offerings kept by the Dalits on a few bricks outside the temple. These were now being thrown away. They even disclosed that Dalits were not allowed to bathe in the sarovar attached to the temple and had to make do with tubewell water.

Events, sadly, took the same turn as they had earlier. A district-level team deputed by the Deputy Commissioner issued a statement after visiting the village that Dalits were never boycotted. The district administration, in a press release after the visit of the team, said one of the incidents of discrimination reported in the story was a few years old and that the mahant of the temple, Govindanand, had claimed publicly that no one was being discriminated against and that Dalits were free to visit the temple as and when they liked. The Tribune team which visited the village three days afterwards was told by the villagers that the mahant had admitted before the team that Dalits were not allowed into the temple and was compelled to assure that this "tradition" would not be followed any longer. Scheduled Castes living in the village said they were never called for the meeting which was held near the old gate in the village. Upper caste people, when questioned about the meeting, said there was a general consensus among the people of the village that non-entry of Scheduled Castes into the shrine was a tradition which should be maintained. "If they want to enter the shrine they can do so, but it would be against tradition", an upper-caste farmer said.

Govindanand, the mahant, speaking to The Tribune three days after the district team had visited the shrine, he admitted that Scheduled Castes were not allowed entry into the shrine.

He said: "We tell them not to enter the shrine but if they do so we do not stop them forcibly." The priest continued to remain steadfast upon his right to purify the shrine in case a Scheduled Caste entered it. "It is my right to cleanse the entire temple with water in case a Dalit enters it and no one can take away my right to do so," he added.

The priest also recounted that some time earlier also he had been questioned by some social workers about discrimination being meted out to lower castes. "I replied that if I wanted I could restrict entry of any person into the temple," he said. Woman devotees sitting at the priest’s feet said it was unfortunate that a bid was being made to change traditions. Govindanand, however, said now Scheduled Castes were free to visit the temple.

Dalits may be free to pay obeisance at the shrine but now a number of them no longer seem keen to do so. Prem Singh, from the sansi tribe, said his team had received a message asking them not to go to the shrine as the atmosphere to visit the shrine was not conducive. The atmosphere can be gauged from the fate of a board installed on the outside gate of the shrine yesterday by the Block Development Officer. The villagers said the BDO had installed the metal board on the facade of the main gate at a height of around 20 feet and also taken photographs of it. The Tribune team later saw that the board had been turned over to ensure the message that the temple was open to all could not be read. Govindanand, when asked about this, said some village boys must have done this because they had been disturbed by the board. Social activists were of the view that the problem at Mandour village could be set right and the issue had to be tackled at a deeper level. Malagar Singh said casteism had seeped into society to such a level that separate dharamshalas and even separate cremation grounds were being set up in villages for the Dalits. He cited the example of Baran village near Patiala where Dalits have a separate cremation ground for which money has reportedly been given by ''jat'' leader Surjit Singh Rakhra in 2001. At present, Rakhra is the Akali legislator from Samana assembly constituency. Others, when questioned on the issue, said the economic position in the villages was also responsible for the growing divide between the Dalits and the upper castes. He said while awareness had made Dalits more assertive as far as wages of their labour was concerned, the farmer was not growing any richer due to continuous land fragmentation as well as increased farming expenditure.