The woman in this picture is a Dalit, and many of you reading this post will have no idea what that means, and have no experience of witnessing the treatment of people “labelled” as Dalits.
Change the word Dalit to “untouchable” and you might, just might begin to understand, but only slightly. Imagine living in your comfortable western surroundings in Europe, America, Australia…. and wake up one morning to find that your passport has been confiscated along with your citizenship rights, you have lost your job, nobody will speak to you, look at you, or touch you. Nobody will touch what you have touched, you cannot take any job except garbage cleaning, toilet cleaning, rubbish collecting. You cannot grow or touch food that is to be eaten by others, you cannot cook food that is to be eaten by others. Welcome to the world of being a Dalit!
The Dalit is the lowest caste in the Hindu world and therefore is a real life situation for many in India and Nepal specifically. They are true outcasts since many of the rights and freedoms we take for granted are denied them, including education directly and indirectly.
I took the photo of this woman early one morning in Bhaktapur, the sun was shining and she sat down to take a break with a cigarette, probably a little ganja. She had methodically swept the dust away from the terracotta brick floor and the small shrine at the foot of the larger temple of Nyatapola in the town centre. She probably earned just enough to feed herself for a single day. Tomorrow …… who knows, who cares?
I was inspired to post this photo following a post by my blogging friend Cady who wrote Just One Person ….. maybe it’s inspirational enough for a weekly challenge?
Categories: Nepal, Photography
No technology, only chalkboards and copy books! 
Tiffin day at a small school in Nepal 
Scenic Sunday: Boudhanath Stupa, Kathmandu 
WordPress Photo Challenge: Scale! 
Affluence breeds a distinctive type of rebellion. Instead of being grateful for the many luxuries, some folks will find something to complain about. They continually want better, more, faster, smarter. They look ahead and miss the present moment.
Your capture of the Dalit women is poignant. Many years ago, I was in Bhaktapur. There were a few street vendors but no beggars at that time. The only beggars I saw were blind and handicapped from leprosy.
The caste system is so entrenched, I cannot see it disappearing. This prejudice seems ingrained in the psyche as there are even layers within the upper Brahmins. They ask for your surname and decide what rank you sit within. It falls to us in the privileged world to help. And we can.
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Thank you for your very perceptive post, we CAN do something but our efforts, including protests, are misdirected. You are right about surnames and read a story somewhere about a young man who went abroad and changed his name. Became highly educated and rich. He returned to his country and did good works until one day someone discovered his original name. He was shunned. Heaven help us!
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How tragic and cruel that he was shunned and nit taken in his merits but something as superficial as his name. This indicates how very difficult it would be to eliminate the caste mentality. Even if it was banned by legal means, it would persist in the cultural traditions and minds of the people for many generations.
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Yes, education is the issue and definitely it’s a big issue in Nepal. But we must do more to influence government to change education systems which perpetuate the current order.
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Absolutely. If we don’t encourage, things will stay the same.
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It’s more than encouragement needed because the international aid community are complicit in maintaining the status quo. My wife and I worked for 10 years in Kathmandu developing model schools and got nowhere. Summary here, a bit jargon ish SSRP stands for school sector reform plan which swallowed £millions in aid https://buddhawalksintoawinebar.blog/2017/01/11/nepal-children-denied-quality-education-for-10-years-and-moe-in-denial/
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Thank you. I will check out your post. When you say you got nowhere were you referring to changing the caste mentality?
I was involved in grass roots community aid programs and we assisted a few commmunity in loads of projects.
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Our objective from the beginning was to change the primary education system nationally. This is one of the points where the caste system can be attacked, such as complete education for Dalits, etc etc
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That is so right. Education of women in particular can change things. I see evidence of this in my own sphere. Changing attitudes over the years towards marginal groups stemmed from classroom teachings.
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Such a poignant photo, but so beautiful too! I am so glad you shared this with us today…….it makes you realize how happy, fortunate and forgiving we should all be! I met a woman from India, on one of the cruises, and asked her about the caste system there. Her reply, “it will always be with us.”
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It’s disgusting!
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I put the feminists in the “they have their own agenda file” and they really don’t care about anyone else……it’s all about them!
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Yes, I have no love for Trump but from day 1 four years ago there were feminists protesting about him instead of women’s issues all over the world.
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I’m glad you posted this story as the more people who understand the Dalit position in India and Nepal (where I didn’t know it also existed) the better. It is a blight on humanity and we should be pressuring the Governments of those countries to effect change. It will take a long, long time though. Social mores and long-held prejudices have a habit of clinging on, and like slavery, to lose the lowest caste in the chain also brings some loss of prestige to the next person up the line – not to mention financial cost.
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That’s a very wise comment, and I appreciate it. It’s even a scourge that happens higher up the caste chain with many young women I know, highly educated, end up in arranged marriages, live in their husbands extended family home, and ….. become “servants”. Why no protests in the western world? Forget the paste, deal with the present!
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This is a very sad picture and story. Hard to believe it still happens in this day and age.
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It does, but nobody cares. Never any protests about it.
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So sad. People can be awful. I noticed that when I left my job… Did you speak to this woman to know her story?
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Sadly not, folks in this situation are very reticent to speak to tourists and my Nepali wouldn’t have been good enough. My wife wasn’t with me at the time.
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Very true
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That’s a very sad situation to be in ..we should stop taking for granted our own wonderful lives
Thanks for posting Dr B
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Thank you and yes, very sad, it’s what angers me a lot when I see mass “feminism” marches in the US, these people often are so blind as to the injustices in other parts of the world.
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