From Quest for Justice to Dalit Identity: A New Look on the Crisis of identity of the Scheduled Castes of West Bengal

Abstract

In the recent years, it has become a common fashion among the social scientists, journalists and popular writers alike to classify the Scheduled Castes of India as Da/its. Being induced by the 'Dalit Panther movement' of the 1970 's, academics of both Dal it and non-Dalit social background; have reinterpreted the protests of the Scheduled Castes against upper castes' oppression and their writings under the banner of 'Dalit Discourse '. These trends eventually have encapsulated the Scheduled Castes within the/old of 'Dalit identity'. However, a major section of the Scheduled Castes of West Bengal has reservation to accept 'Dalit identity ' what the Dalit writers and non-Dalit scholars are· trying to impose on them. Rather, they are more comfortable to be identified as Scheduled Castes in the society. This paper has analyzed that the social movement of the Scheduled Castes of late colonial Bengal is losing its dignity in the recent years because of classification of the Scheduled Castes merely as Dalits. Simultaneously the author has argued that 'construction of Dalit identity' of the Scheduled Castes is a theoretical imposition on theh1 at least in case of West Bengal.