A 19-year-old Dalit woman was allegedly gang-raped and savagely murdered by men of a higher caste in Hathras, Uttar Pradesh. In this Dalit Camera: Through Un-Touchable Eyes interview from 2013, award-winning professor Sukhadeo Thorat explains why Dalit women are sometimes specifically targeted for sexual violence.
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00:00The sexual assault of Dalit women is something which hurt most.
00:03You want to hurt the Dalit pride and the best thing is to hurt their women.
00:09There is a growing tendency that has come up now is to humiliate Dalit.
00:17We have the problem of patriarchy certainly.
00:21The lower status of women, inferior citizenship, not being able to enjoy equal right.
00:29It may be property, it may be many other sphere, cultural sphere.
00:34And sexual violence that is the sexual behavior against the will of women
00:41is a part of that patriarchal behavior.
00:45Now in case of shadow caste women get a lot more aggravated
00:49because as it is they are lowest in the social hierarchy
00:54and the untouchable are denied equal right in many sphere.
01:03And at the bottom of the ladder come the Dalit women really.
01:08And so see the Dalit women became a lot more vulnerable
01:14to even the issue of discrimination and atrocities.
01:17So even there are atrocities, there is a growing tendency that has come up now is to
01:26humiliate Dalit by physical assault and by burning in a whatever case, selective cases we get.
01:36But the sexual assault of Dalit women is something which hurt most.
01:41So that is the one that is being chosen then by the high caste.
01:45You want to hurt the Dalit pride and the best thing is to hurt their women.
01:51So those incidences you do get and it has the, its roots are lies in the patriarchy
01:59as well as its interrelation with caste, not patriarchy alone.
02:02From patriarchy every other woman also suffer, you know,
02:06the lack of right and the subordination and not sharing power.
02:12This is the problem from which Dalit women also suffer.
02:15Additionally, the caste related subordination, untouchability related subordination
02:22makes the problem of Dalit women different from that of other women.
02:27And that's why they talk about the Dalit women problem being similar but at the same time different.
02:34So I think the roots lies in the ideology of caste, ideology of
02:39of
02:42describing them, considering them as inferior, subject which is available
02:49and traditional obligation, caste obligations.
02:54So it's a part of that cultural caste related ideology.
02:58Position, isolated position, vulnerable position, power relation, these all matters.
03:09you