Human Trafficking Allegations Thrust Caste Into Spotlight For American Hindus By
at 2:00 am NPR
Software engineers and stone masons might not have much in common professionally, but both kinds of workers can face discrimination, if they re members of the Dalit caste in Hindu society â whether in South Asia or the United States.
So say leading advocates for the rights of Dalits, who were once known as Untouchables.
A class-action lawsuit recently filed in federal court in New Jersey alleges that a massive Hindu temple in the city of Robbinsville brought some 200 workers to the U.S. on R-1 visas as religious volunteers. But their lawyers filed court papers saying they were really held against their will, forced to work 13-hour shifts for weeks on end with no time off and paid just a little more than one dollar an hour.
Two Trinamul Congress leaders were killed in north Bengal on Tuesday night as the spate of violence following the counting of votes continued unabated in the region.
Deepak Roy, 32, a vice-president of the Trinamul Youth Congress’s Alipurduar 1 block unit and a resident of Mathura, was killed when he was returning home from a wedding party.
When a car carrying Roy and five of his friends reached near a stone crushing unit around 11.30pm, they found that the road had been blocked with a tractor. Before Deepak and his friends could gauge what was happening, men carrying weapons circled the car and attacked them.
District Trinamul leaders posted a minute-long video clip on social media on Saturday that claimed local BJP MP Nisith Pramanik had recently resorted to a “publicity stunt” with a broom on Cooch Behar palace grounds.
After a cultural event at the royal palace, the MP and his associates threw garbage on palace premises and his aides shot a video of the parliamentarian and some others sweeping the place with brooms, Trinamul’s district chief Partha Pratim Roy alleged, with the short clip to apparently back it up.
Pramanik, in Calcutta for Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Sunday rally, could not be contacted by this paper, but district BJP leaders brushed aside Trinamul’s claim.
Farmer Ambadas Sanap, a plaid bandana around his neck and a Hindu mark of devotion on his forehead, grows tomatoes and bell peppers. He says he d participate in the protests except he s too busy trying to sell his crops to feed his family of 9. Lauren Frayer/NPR
toggle caption Lauren Frayer/NPR
Farmer Ambadas Sanap, a plaid bandana around his neck and a Hindu mark of devotion on his forehead, grows tomatoes and bell peppers. He says he d participate in the protests except he s too busy trying to sell his crops to feed his family of 9. Lauren Frayer/NPR
NASHIK, India – In a dusty lot outside a wholesale market in western India, farmer Ambadas Sanap leans on the lip of his flatbed truck, surrounded by crates of green peppers and tomatoes. If he could get away from all this for just one day, he says, he d travel to the capital to protest.