Senior PhD Scholar of Sociology, Centre for the Study of Social Systems, School of Social Sciences, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India
Online published on 25 June, 2019.
Human rights are indissoluble, in alienable, fundamental, basic and natural rights. Human rights are those rights which are inherent in our nature and without that one cannot live. In the last few decades, we have witnessed the human rights discourse and movements have taken prominent role for human development and providing their rights. Hence, violation of human rights is one of the fundamental problems across the globe. We witnessed many instances where human rights of the people are violated and it has become an everyday phenomenon. In this paper an attempt is made to study the human rights violation of Dalit Christians in India. At the outset an attempt has been made to through light on some key concept used in this paper, human rights, religion, caste and Dalit Christian. The paper analyses that Dalit Christians are integral part of Hindu social order and suffers multiple discrimination and exclusion by the state, society and community. A specific focus has been made here to analyse the role of the state in violating the constitutional and human rights of Dalit Christians in India. This paper argues that caste and human rights are contradictory with each other's and the modern state has used rule of law and legitimatise discrimination of its citizens on the basis of certain religious affiliation which goes against the ethos of human rights.
Human rights, caste, discrimination, exclusion, equality, dignity, justice