Protest held over ‘demeaning’ religious ritual

Protest staged outside the Police Head Quarters at Nrupatunga Road

By Desiree Alemao

BANGALORE (Dec. 1)—A Dalit activist group on Thursday staged a protest demanding justice for the activist who was assaulted three days ago for protesting against a controversial religious ritual criticized as demeaning to its lower-caste devotees.

The ritual involves lower-caste people rolling on plantain leaves holding the leftovers of meal served to Brahmins.

It was conducted at Udupi Krishna Mutt in coastal Karnataka on Wednesday and on Monday at the premises of the Kukke Subramanya temple in southern Karnataka, where K.S. Shivaramu was beaten up.

At Thursday’s rally outside the local police headquarters at Nrupatunga Road in central Bangalore, Dalit Sangarsh Samiti demanded that action be taken against those who assaulted the activist.

“If they want to do things like this they might as well start practicing suttee again,” DSS member Mr. Nandakumar said.

The DSS is prodding the government ban such religious ceremonies, which they claim are archaic and out of place in a society aiming to promote equality among all castes and creeds.

DSS belive the police does not want to adress their issues.

The DSS believes the police do not wish to address their complaints and hence have been slow to respond.

The director general of police (law and order), Dipin Gopalkrishna, said the police were trying to identify the assailants from the video clips they have and will continue to investigate the incident.

“Once the suspects are identified, the necessary action will be taken,” he said.

“We cannot just suspect people and arrest them without proper investigation, so by the time the police came there, the crowd had dispersed hence there was no action taken,” Gopalkrishna said.

He said the police could not deal with all the priests and local authorities involved as they do not have the power to do so. If action needs to be taken in such a case they need to approach the magistrate or the court, he added.

Rajagopal, student leader of the Republican Party of India, who was also present, said that incidences of similar archaic ceremonies have increased since the Bharatiya Janata Party took power in the state in 2008.