NEW DELHI — “We are Hindus no more, and inferior to nobody,” declared Ramkumar, a low-caste Indian from the northern Indian state of Utter Pradesh.

Ramkumar, a bureaucrat in the state government, traveled to New Delhi from his remote village to participate in the mass conversion ceremony held in the Indian capital city Nov. 4. At the ceremony, an estimated 20,000 low-caste Dalits renounced Hinduism for Buddhism.

The Dalit conversions provoked outrage among Hindu nationalists, who accused Christians of orchestrating them in order to advance their own religion. Catholic leaders in India reject such charges, but defend the right of the Dalits to convert to the religion of their choice.

Ramkumar's post-conversion remarks reflect the plight of hundreds of millions of low-caste people in India. Although a low-level government employee, he is expected to remain physically removed from upper-caste colleagues in his office. As well, he said, “In our village tea shop we have to sit on the floor to drink tea and we are not allowed to use any public facilities with the upper castes.”

By converting to Buddhism, “At least our children should be saved from this shameful existence,” Ramkumar said.

According to some historians, the caste system originated in India around 3,500 years ago as an aftermath of Aryan invasion. Aryans from Central Asia invaded the original inhabitants of the land and destroyed their culture. Some of the defeated withdrew to the forests, while others submitted to the conquerors and became the low castes.

The roots of the caste system can also be seen in Hindu scriptures, which divide society into four varnas, or tiers: the Brahmin, or priestly class; the Kshatriya, or warrior class, the vaisha, or trading class; and the sudra, or serving class. Beneath the sudra are the untouchables, who in traditional Hindu society were required to follow menial and degrading occupations like scavenging and removal of carrion.

The untouchables were not permitted to enter temples, schools or any public places and could not withdraw water from public wells. Forced to live in dirty huts outside of villages and cities, they were required to remain at least 32 yards from caste Hindu to prevent the latter from being “polluted.” Hindus consider the caste system to be hereditary in nature.

In the last century, as Indian society became more democratic, Mahatma Gandhi rechristened the lower caste as Harijans, which means men of God. Now they call themselves Dalits, which means “oppressed, “ and they remain socially and economically disadvantaged despite their theoretical emancipation when India became independent in 1948.

According to government data, around 900 types of low castes exist among India's 1 billion residents, comprising more than 250 million people.

Liberation at Last?

Leaders of the Nov. 4 conversion ceremony say it is only the beginning.

“We will not allow the upper castes to exploit us any more,” said Ram Raj, chief organizer of the ceremony. “We, the oppressed millions in the country, started a new movement and will organize mass conversions throughout the country.”

Raj, who is chairman of a confederation of low-caste organizations, was rechristened as Udit (“having risen”) Raj at the Nov. 4 ceremony. He is a senior officer with the Indian government's taxation department who has been on leave since becoming involved with the movement to improve the circumstances of the low caste.

It was the third such mass conversion of Dalits. The first, involving about 500,000 people, was held in 1956 by B.R. Ambedkar, the founding father of the Indian constitution and a low-caste leader, at Pune in the state of Maharashtra.

In 1981, entire villages in the state of Tamil Nadu abandoned Hinduism for Islam, a move that generated communal tension in South India.

The latest mass conversion to Buddhism drew international attention after Hindu organizations publicly opposed the ceremony.

India's federal government, which is controlled by the pro-Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party, took measures to obstruct the ceremony. Organizers said government officials blocked buses and trucks, preventing thousands of Dalits from attending. As well, local police withdrew permission to hold the function at the allotted venue just before it began, forcing organizers to scramble to find a replacement site.

Said Raj, “They tried all the options to disturb the function, only because we belong to the low castes.”

Two days before the event, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, or World Hindu Council, held a press conference charging that it was a Christian conspiracy.

Hindu extremists have carried out a series of violent attacks on Christians in recent years in India. The extremists claim that Christians, who comprise less than 3% of the Indian population, are seeking to convert the entire country and destroy its Hindu heritage.

Ashok Singhal, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad's international president, told the Register that Christian leaders had raised money from abroad for the event. Said Singhal, “The ceremony was anti-national and politically motivated.”

Venkaih Naidu, the secretary general of the Bharatiya Janata Party and a government minister, supported the council's charges and said that the government is investigating the allegations.

Charistian Support

In fact, some Christian leaders, including Joseph D'Souza and John Dayal of the All India Christian Council and K.P. Yohannan of Gospel for Asia, were present at the Buddhist conversion ceremony. Explained Dayal, “We were there to declare solidarity with millions of oppressed.”

But the Catholic bishops of India denied any direct involvement in the mass conversion.

“We extended our support to the conversion only because it is the fundamental right of each citizen to choose any faith of his preference,” said Archbishop Oswald Gracias of Agra, the secretary general of the bishops’ conference.

Father Donald de Souza, the conference's deputy secretary general, said the conversions are a call to the government to examine the plight of the low castes. He said Dalits prefer to convert to Buddhism, rather that Christianity, because they can retain their constitutional rights to “reservations.”

The reservation policy in the constitution provides certain economic and social privileges to the low caste people, such as government jobs and university places. The rights are lost if they convert to Christianity.

“We have fought to get reservation rights for converted Christians for the last 50 years, but the government has turned them down fearing a flow of low castes to Christianity,” Father de Souza said.

The chairman of the federal commission on low castes, Dilip Singh Bhuria, agreed that their living conditions remain poor. “Millions of low castes are still living under bondage, even after 53 years of independence,” he said.

Conversion may not result in immediate improvements, Udit Raj admitted. But it would give the Dalits confidence and grant them the inner strength to fight for their rights, he added.

Lakshmi, a low-caste housewife from a remote Central Indian village, has already been emboldened by her Buddhist conversion. “We don't need the Hindu temples or their gods any more,” she said. “We will construct a temple for Lord Buddha in our village.”

Bindu Milton writes from New Delhi