DALIT WOMEN IN POLITICS: AGENCY, CAREER AND TRENDS
CSR Annual Event and Workshop

22 April 2005, India International Centre, New Delhi

“Marginalisation and racial exclusion” speaks of the life of the dalits. Yet for many dalit women, the situation is even worse, they are the "dalit of the dalit community" in Indian society - the oppressed victims of centuries of social, political, economic, cultural and religious pressures. Dalit women in India live a precarious existence combining abject poverty with grinding labor in the fields and work places; and in the home they are abused and used, powerless and exploited.

The seminar on "Dalit women in Politics: Agency, Career and Trends” focused on the understanding of the agency and structure within which the dalit women exist and operate. The seminar was also an attempt to unfold the various factors determining their social relations and understand their experience of discriminatory practices at different points in their lives. The discussions in the seminar aimed to explore and gain insight from the transition in the life of the dalit women through their representation in politics and participation in decision-making processes.

Further the seminar also sought to find out the role that a dalit woman plays in politics, the issues she faces within the women's movement as Dalit issues have not been taken seriously. Within the Dalit movement, women have been ignored. Other lines of discussion were focused on alternative avenues that would ensure mobility, respect and recognition of a dalit woman.

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