Caste is one of India’s most enduring institutions and still retains its hold on Indian society. For those not fortunate to be born in the higher echelons of the caste hierarchy, life can be difficult indeed. Despite government efforts, caste discrimination is still rife, and low-caste Indians have to bear the brunt of poverty, illiteracy and violence. Lenin Raghuvanshi is in the forefront of the fight against caste discrimination, to ensure a just and equal society.
Raghuvanshi is the founder of the People’s Vigilance Committee on Human Rights (PVCHR), which fights for the rights of marginalized people in several North Indian states, especially in the area around Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh.
Raghuvanshi was born in an upper caste family, which he describes as “feudal”. He got a bachelor’s degree in ayurveda, modern medicine and surgery from the State Ayurvedic College in Haridwar. But the social inequities that faced India made him take up the cause of bonded labourers. This is when he noticed that not a single bonded labourer came from the upper caste, and realised that the problem was essentially caste.
In 1996, Raghuvanshi founded PVCHR to fight the caste system. He works to ensure basic rights to vulnerable groups like children, women, Dalits, tribes and minorities. Raghuvanshi and his team works at the grassroots level in Varanasi and around 200 villages in Uttar Pradesh and five other states. PVCHR works to eliminate situations that give rise to the exploitation of vulnerable and marginalized groups, and to start a movement for a people-friendly movement (Jan Mitra Samaj) through an inter-institutional approach.
Raghuvanshi has his task cut out for him since the lot of Dalits and other oppressed minorities continues to be dismal. “In the past, if anyone from the lower caste breached the unwritten law of caste hierarchy, the person would be beaten up in public. Now the person will be shot dead and the village burnt down and the women raped. A bridegroom riding a horse during his wedding, an enterprising peasant digging a well on his land, if a boy falls in love with a girl – do you kill them? Yet, if they belong to the Dalit caste they are killed. We still say that there is rule of law in India,” he said in his acceptance speech while receiving the Gwangju Prize for Human Rights.
He is also concerned about the plight of women and children in this country. “India is still very much a patriarchal and caste-based society with gender discrimination. The destructive effects of gender discrimination, patriarchal oppression and the semi-feudal society so prevalent in 21st century India are manifest in our 55 million children, employed at times in subhuman conditions,” he says in a newspaper interview.
Raghuvanshi received the Gwangju Human Rights Award in 2007. He was made an Ashoka Fellow in 2001 and was presented the International Human Rights Prize of the City of Weimar (Germany) in 2010. Raghuvanshi once said to a newspaper that caste discrimination is so rife in Bundelkhand that a Dalit has to take off his chappal and hold it in his hand if a person belonging to the Thakur caste approaches. It’s not something that would make us proud.
Friday, May 22, 2020
Tuesday, May 19, 2020
Saturday, November 12, 2016
Friday, November 11, 2016
Tuesday, September 29, 2015
Solutions against extremism through pluralism, Lenin Raghuvanshi
Lenin Raghuvanshi is speaking in the second Global Tolerance Forum 2015 "Solutions
against extremism through pluralism".Please listen speech in follows
link:
Crisis of democracy and the Caste System in India http://www.pvchr.net/2014/09/
‘Banaras Convention’ for a comprehensive, medley, plural and inclusive culture:
It
is noted that in this program along with me Ms. Helle Merete Brix, a
journalist, author and lecturer, Mr. Kjell Magne Bondevik, a president
of the Oslo Center for Peace and Human Rights and Ex- Prime Minister of
Norway, Mr. Suleman Nagdi, Loretta Napoleoni, an Italian journalist and
political analyst, Haras Rafiq, Shanthikumar Hettiarachchi, Tino
Sanandaji, a Kurdish economist, Iyad El-Baghdadi, a writer, human rights
activist and Maryam Faghihimani were the key speakers.
is noted that in this program along with me Ms. Helle Merete Brix, a
journalist, author and lecturer, Mr. Kjell Magne Bondevik, a president
of the Oslo Center for Peace and Human Rights and Ex- Prime Minister of
Norway, Mr. Suleman Nagdi, Loretta Napoleoni, an Italian journalist and
political analyst, Haras Rafiq, Shanthikumar Hettiarachchi, Tino
Sanandaji, a Kurdish economist, Iyad El-Baghdadi, a writer, human rights
activist and Maryam Faghihimani were the key speakers.
Please read follows links:
#drammen #tolerance #varanasi #kashi #modi #RG #india #pluralism
Sunday, August 23, 2015
Sunday, November 09, 2014
Satyamev Jayate - Season 3 | Episode 6 | When Masculinity Harms Men
When Masculinity Harms Men
95% of incidents of violence in India are committed by men. The final episode of Season 3 examines why this is the case and how deeply-entrenched notions of masculinity affect attitudes towards women. The episode also helps explain the larger violence we witness in society, be it in incidents of road rage, ragging or acid attacks. It explores how fixed notions of masculinity are shaped and how they victimize not only those at the receiving end, but men themselves as well.
On youtube:
Guest profile:
Dr Lenin Raghuvanshi grew up in Uttar Pradesh where he saw unequal relationships between men and women, with the men being stronger, violent and controlling of the women. He chose a different path for himself and went on to become one of the founding members of People's Vigilance Committee on Human Rights, a Varanasi-based NGO which works for the upliftment of the marginalized sections of the society. He is also a Dalit rights activist.
Email: lenin@pvchr.asia | Website: www.pvchr.asia
How masculinity ends up crippling men, depriving them of expressing normal human emotions like love, pain and vulnerability is the focus of this segment. Five men originally from the U.P.-Haryana regions talk about how they were taught by their own families to suppress their instincts and conform to a certain stereotype of being male and how this manifested in their behaviour.
Friday, September 12, 2014
Friday, August 29, 2014
BANARAS CONVENTION {PART - 2}
"To get in touch with the many problems, still existing in Indian society, this Brochure should be a Symbol to “feel” and don’t forget, what’s still worth to fighting for – the beauty and variety of India and its people. Don’t leave them behind!" – Dr. Lenin Raghuvanshi, CEO PVCHR
Thursday, August 28, 2014
BANARAS CONVENTION {PART - 1}
"To get in touch with the many problems, still existing in Indian society, this Brochure should be a Symbol to “feel” and don’t forget, what’s still worth to fighting for – the beauty and variety of India and its people. Don’t leave them behind!" – Dr. Lenin Raghuvanshi, CEO PVCHR
Saturday, April 19, 2014
The need of the hour is to create new dynamics and debate within India: Lenin Raghuvanshi
We had a strong Dalit movement before formation of RSS in 1925. We have saints like Kabeer, Raidas who were an epitome of our syncretic, plural and tolerant Indian culture. Hindutva has nothing to do with Hindu religion per se. The Hindutva ideology was a manifestation of British colonialism. The greatest ideologue of RSS Guru Golwalkar himself advised RSS cadres not to fight against the British occupation. They have an expansionist ideology. On one hand they are exploiting the dalits and on the other they are attacking other nationalities. They are even unhappy with me as I am fighting against casteism that forms a fundamental feature of their ideology. But the unfortunate part of the whole matter is that now major political parties are influenced by Hindutva ideology. http://thekashmirscenario.com/prominent-activist-co-founder-peoples-vigilance-committee-human-rights-pvchr-lenin-raghuvanshi-conversation-mushtaq-ul-haq-ahmad-sikander-early-life-influences-work-h/
Prominent Activist and Co-Founder Peoples Vigilance Committee on Human Rights (PVCHR), Lenin Raghuvanshi in a conversation with Mushtaq Ul Haq Ahmad Sikander, about his early life, influences, work, Hindutva and future plans
Tell us something about yourself?
I was born in plural family. Each member was different from another, yet they lived under one roof. My Grandfather was Gandhian, but there was contrast in him as he was a socialist and atheist too. My grandmother was religious. My father initially joined RSS, but Grandmother told him that the uniform black cap of RSS is anti-Hindu. Then my dad became a communist, but he is still religious. There was always an ideological tussle going on between my grandparents and parents. My Grandfather wanted me to be a Gandhian and my Father wanted me to become a communist. Hence this tussle gave me an exposure to varied shades of opinion since my childhood. Later on I self studied various philosophies, ideologies and religions, and five great people influenced my life and thoughts particularly and they include Prophet Jesus (pbuh), Prophet Muhammad (pbuh), Karl Marx, Buddha and Dr.B.R Ambedkar. I grew up in the Eastern part of Uttar Pradesh (U.P) that has nationalist links with mainstream India. Though in certain parts of U.P, RSS and Congress type mentality also prevails. But I envisage that we create different nations within India, as India has the potential for tolerating many sub Nations.
What is your educational background?
I studied Indian Medicine system at a Gurukul Kangri in Haridwar.
Keeping in view your professional education background, how were you inclined towards activism?
As I stated earlier that my father wanted me to become a full time Communist Party worker, but I wasn’t inclined to it whole heartedly. In 1989, I joined United Nations Youth Organization and started my activism with that. In 1993 I came to head its U.P chapter. In the same year we started Bachpan Bachao Aandulan (Movement for saving childhood). During that movement, I witnessed that there were no child laborers from upper caste people. Meanwhile I also got married in 1992, and my spouse also helped me in my activism and believed in my work.
So when and what reasons led to the establishment of Peoples Vigilance Committee on Human Rights (PVCHR)?
In 1996, I along with my wife Shruti founded the PVCHR. It is a community based organization, to break the closed, feudal hierarchies of conservative slums and villages by building up local institutions and supporting them with a high profile and active human rights network. The caste based violence, exploitation of poorer sections of the society and the marginalization of Dalits and Adivasis led to the establishment of PVCHR.
What kind of activities does PVCHR engage with?
We work against the Caste system and the structural prejudice associated with it. We work for the reconciliation among communities. We are also working for making the environment conducive for Truth and Reconciliation. We are initiating a discussion about democracy and human rights in the cow belt. Presently we have more than fifty thousand members and in more than four hundred villages we are carrying out our activities.
So did your efforts help in bringing any Positive change?
Yes, there is a lot of change in more than two hundred villages. Since 2000 there has been no communal violence in Banaras, heart of the cow belt. Many religious leaders have united against Hindutva Fascism. The Mushar community has become confident and an indigenous leadership has evolved among them. 2/3rd Dalits, Muslims and OBCs are elected members in Governing Board of PVCHR from 2010.
Do you face any threats or intimidation regarding your work?
Yes the threats and intimidation tactics are very common, both by State and Non State actors.
Is PVCHRs particular focus presently on torture victims?
Yes, we are strongly focusing on the victims of torture. Since 2008 we are using Testimonial Therapy developed by PVCHR and Danish Organization Research and Rehabilitation center for Torture Victims (RCT) for the survivors of torture, in order to make them overcome the aftermath trauma associated with torture. Our testimonial Therapy model are using by partners of RCT in Srilanka, Cambodia and Philippines.
You have been talking and writing about what you call as the “Culture of Impunity” as prevalent in India. What does this Culture of Impunity mean?
Peace without Justice and suffering in silence is culture of impunity. Our constitution is modern but the rules are colonial. The Police Act 1861, can be a reference point. It was implemented by the British in India after the 1857 mutiny. It was anti India in its connotations and stature, but still there has been no change in it despite the fact that British left India in 1947.
So how to Fight and Resist against this culture of impunity?
The culture of impunity breaks humans. During the freedom struggle Muslims were fighting alongside with other communities, but where are they now? This culture of impunity has wrecked much harm and is responsible for numerous atrocities against minorities, dalits and adivasis. It helps the guilty, culprits and perpetuators of these atrocities go scot free. We still have draconian laws like Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) imposed on various parts of India, where the security forces have committed grave human rights abuses because of this blanket culture of impunity. We must educate, organize and agitate against this culture of impunity. We must be able to provide Psycho-Social support to the victims. Then there is a need to create debate about this culture of impunity. For Justice to be established we need to tell the truth and put up the facts before the people.
What is your opinion about the Hindutva fascism and their suppression of minorities?
We had a strong Dalit movement before formation of RSS in 1925. We have saints like Kabeer, Raidas who were an epitome of our syncretic, plural and tolerant Indian culture. Hindutva has nothing to do with Hindu religion per se. The Hindutva ideology was a manifestation of British colonialism. The greatest ideologue of RSS Guru Golwalkar himself advised RSS cadres not to fight against the British occupation. They have an expansionist ideology. On one hand they are exploiting the dalits and on the other they are attacking other nationalities. They are even unhappy with me as I am fighting against casteism that forms a fundamental feature of their ideology. But the unfortunate part of the whole matter is that now major political parties are influenced by Hindutva ideology.
You have also been writing that caste based structural biases and violence is embedded in our system. How do you explain the same?
During childhood days my grandma used to tell me, not to eat while facing south, neither sleep keeping your legs in the direction. Elderly in the village said not to visit southern quarter of the village. Since childhood I used to wonder what the secret of this word ‘Dakhkhin Tola’ (south ghetto) is.
As I grew up, started reading, started social activism, fought for the rights of bonded labours and traveled across the globe then I realized that in the south of every village there is South Africa (a Dalit quarter ) as ‘culture of silence’.
The silence imposed by draconian suppression sanctified by religious rituals of the Upper Caste was such that the outside world knew little about this colossal cruelty. Justice V.R.Krishna Iyer, former Judge, Supreme Court of India described the plight of the Dalits in the following words, “Courts to them are alien, laws their enemy and human justice their despair.”
The caste system continues to determine political, social, and economic lives of a billion people in South Asia. The caste system, straddling across the scrawny shoulders of the Untouchables, is like that Old man in Tolstoy’s story, who has all the sympathy for the poor bearer and would like to do anything but to get off his shoulder. The most significant aspect of caste is its ability to resurface without a trace of remorse on the part of the perpetrator. It is like that chemical addiction which once had makes you vulnerable to its guiles forever.
American modern conservative thinker Edmund Burke says correctly about India many years before, “In that Country the law of religion, the laws of the land, and the law of honour, are all united and consolidated in one, and bind a man eternally to the rule of what is called his caste.”
Traditional political system and Hindu fascist forces are trying hard to maintain the old system of the power game. Money and muscle power, together with political string-pulling, often result in denial of justice for the hapless ‘have-nots’, especially the Dalits (untouchables), ravaged by poverty and illiteracy.
Atrocities and extortion on the Dalits, fake encounters, refusal to register complaints against the well-heeled, arbitrary arrests on false charges, illegal detention and custodial deaths are in commonplace.
In the absence of a modern social audit system, the keepers of the law often unleash a ‘police raj’, especially in rural India. A crippled National Human Rights Commission and its state subsidiaries with limited recommendatory control and a dysfunctional Legal Aid System depict a gloomy picture indeed.
Ironically, even after having shed the colonial yoke, its legacy continues in the administrative framework of our independent India marked with widespread corruption which has rendered many government-sponsored schemes in rural India a failure.
You have also written that Indian police has learnt the tactic of Community Punishment from caste system. How can these two be related?
You can witness this fact in India. If an upper caste person commits a crime, if ever he is punished, he will bear it solitarily. But if a lower caste person commits any crime the whole community will be punished for one man’s deeds. The Police have learnt community punishment from casteism. Also see how the Caste and Class structures are reinforced by the state machinery. Why are the regiments named on caste and class denominations like Rajputana, Dogra etc, whereas such amalgamations are contradictory to the constitution?
The Police atrocities against common people particularly the marginalized sections of society are growing with each passing day. What are the reasons responsible for that?
Police is the prime executive for the protection of Human Rights of common people. But in India the mindset of Police as inculcated by 1861 Police Act is synonymous to the British period when the Police saw all Indians as enemies. Even after Freedom Indian police witnesses citizens as its enemies. Hence the police reforms are must. We also need representation of minorities and marginalized sections of society in the police in order to change its outlook, bias and perception about them.
In most cases where the Police is found guilty of committing atrocities against the innocent civilians, we witness that they usually go scot free, while the innocent continue to suffer?
The prevalent culture of impunity is responsible for the guilty policemen going scot free. In Crpc and AFSPA the police and army have got the legal impunity that makes their persecution or punishment impossible. We want to amend and remove these draconian laws. Armed Forces Special Power ordnance was imposed by the British colonial administration to crush the Quit India Movement that started in 1942, but even after Freedom Indian State implemented more draconian law as Armed Forces Special Power Act(AFSPA). Indian State is still not ready to pass the Anti Torture Bill. How can in such an environment you hope for policemen to be punished. These black laws create problems for National integration. We need to fight the mindset that is obstructing the amendment or revocation of these draconian laws, under the veil of National interests and sovereignty.
The growing corporatization is having severe ramifications on Nation Building and integrity. How can we resist this onslaught?
We need to strength the Neo Dalit movement. Neo-dalit campaign is against politics of division, exploitation and hatred with an alternative of unity of broken masses on base of reconciliation, democracy, secularism and non violence. First unity is unity against caste system, a historical system of exclusion i.e. unity among the lower castes people that have been suppressed since centuries with the progressive anti-caste people born in upper caste. This will be first of its kind unity, which will not be against any person born in to upper caste communities neither against any religion. Second unity is unity among minorities and communities who suffered with communal fascism, those who believe in communal harmony and people with secular values against neo-fascism. Unity of all poor from all communities against the suffering with neo-liberal policy is the third kind of unity. Fighting against neoliberal policy is not against democratic capitalism for people. Since those broken with different kinds of suppression and exclusion means dalit therefore these three kinds of unities is base of impart the neo-dalit movement. These three need to join hands and unitedly fight against the menace of corporatization based on exclusion, anti-people and anti-environment norms. We are opposing the corporatization whereas attacking cultural imperialism too, and trying to build pressure on Government through people demand for more budget on social structure such as education, health etc . If we will not fight against corporatization, they will make the country and people slave to their corporate goals.
Given your busy activist schedule, how do you balance that with your personal family life and its demands?
My wife Shruti is also an activist, while our son Kabeer is an independent child. We still live together in a joint family and I visit my parents when I find time.
So what are the future plans of PVCHR?
We are going to work in Kashmir, not for political negotiations or for solving Kashmir issue. We want to meet the victims and survivors of torture. We want to ask for pardons for the atrocities committed by the Indian State, and start reconciliation with people of Kashmir. We also want to offer psychological support to the victims of torture through Testimonial Therapy.
Any message for people?
The people must believe in themselves. The need of the hour is to create new dynamics and debate within India. The people musty make alliances with Dalits, Anti-Hindutva Movement and other marginalized people. The debate about Kashmir must be initiated within Indian particularly the cow belt, and it is obligatory on Kashmiris to change the mindset of the inhabitants of cow belt as far as Kashmir and other issues are concerned.
Lenin Raghuvanshi can be reached at pvchr.india@gmail.com
Mushtaq Ul Haq Ahmad Sikander is Writer-Activist based in Srinagar, Kashmir and can be reached at sikandarmushtaq@gmail.com
Friday, January 10, 2014
...जब इटली से आए विदेशियों ने यहां लगाई दिलचस्प पंचायत!
..जब इटली से आए विदेशियों ने यहां लगाई दिलचस्प पंचायत!
वाराणसी. इटली से आए 32 लोगों की एक टीम ने पिंडरा ब्लाक के सराय गांव के
मुसहर बस्ती में अपनी पंचायत लगाई। बेरोजगारी और अशिक्षा की वजह से इस
बस्ती के लोग बंधुआ मजदूरी के चंगुल में दशकों से फंसे थे।
मानवाधिकार जन निगरानी समिति के अचूक प्रयासों की वजह से आज पूरा गांव इस
दलदल से बाहर आ चुका है। इन ग्रामीणों के संघर्ष कि दिलचस्प कहानी को सुनने
और जांबाज़ी को सलाम करने इटली से यह टीम यहां पहुंची।
ग्रामीण
राम दयाल ने बताया कि मानवाधिकार जननिगरानी ने 2004 में इस गांव में लोगों
को एकजुट करना शुरू किया, जब यहां पर लोग बंधुआ मजदूरी करते थे। यहां इन
लोगों के पास जीवन जीने के लिए कोई भी मूलभूत सुविधाए उपलब्ध नहीं थी। लोग
दबंगों से बहुत डरे और सहमे रहते थे।
इसके बाद बस्ती में
धीरे-धीर लोगों में जागरूकता बढ़ी और योजनाओं तक लोगों की पहुंच बढ़ी।
महासचिव डॉ लेलिन ने बताया कि ये विदेशी उन दलितों मुसहर जाति के लोगों से
प्रभावित हैं, जो कभी गुलाम हुआ करते थे। बंधुआ मजदूरी के गर्त में डूबे
हुए थे। आज की इस बदली हुई तस्वीर को देखने ही इटली से इतने सारे लोग यहां
आए हैं।
क्या कहा इटली से आई टीम ने
फादर बरनैडो
सर्वेलेरा ने बताया कि ग्रामीणों में गजब का आत्मविश्वास है। इन लोगों ने
जीवन की दिशा और दशा दोनों को बदला है। इटली से आए अन सभी लोगों ने इनके
संघर्ष की लड़ाई से बहुत कुछ सीखा है।
हम इसे इटली के लोगों को
बताएंगे कि कैसे संसाधन विहीन समुदाय ने संघर्ष से अपने जीवन को खुशहाल
बनाया है। फादर बरनैडो सर्वेलेरा ने कहा कि हर ईसाई और कैथोलिक उनके
अहिंसात्मक संघर्षों के साथ है।
आगे देखें इटली से आए इन लोगों ने कैसे जानी गांव वालों की दास्तां...
Friday, December 27, 2013
Fighting caste discrimination
How can you Help?
Caste approaches is not something that would make us proud
Contact details of the NGO/Institution
Name : Lenin Raghuvanshi
Email ID : lenin@pvchr.asia
Contact Number : 9935599333
Website : http://www.pvchr.asia
Address : PVCHR Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh
Fighting caste discrimination
Caste is one of India’s most enduring institutions and still retains its hold on Indian society. For those not fortunate to be born in the higher echelons of the caste hierarchy, life can be difficult indeed. Despite government efforts, caste discrimination is still rife, and low-caste Indians have to bear the brunt of poverty, illiteracy and violence. Lenin Raghuvanshi is in the forefront of the fight against caste discrimination, to ensure a just and equal society.
Raghuvanshi is the founder of the People’s Vigilance Committee on Human Rights (PVCHR), which fights for the rights of marginalized people in several North Indian states, especially in the area around Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh.
Raghuvanshi was born in an upper caste family, which he describes as “feudal”. He got a bachelor’s degree in ayurveda, modern medicine and surgery from the State Ayurvedic College in Haridwar. But the social inequities that faced India made him take up the cause of bonded labourers. This is when he noticed that not a single bonded labourer came from the upper caste, and realised that the problem was essentially caste.
In 1996, Raghuvanshi founded PVCHR to fight the caste system. He works to ensure basic rights to vulnerable groups like children, women, Dalits, tribes and minorities. Raghuvanshi and his team works at the grassroots level in Varanasi and around 200 villages in Uttar Pradesh and five other states. PVCHR works to eliminate situations that give rise to the exploitation of vulnerable and marginalized groups, and to start a movement for a people-friendly movement (Jan Mitra Samaj) through an inter-institutional approach.
Raghuvanshi has his task cut out for him since the lot of Dalits and other oppressed minorities continues to be dismal. “In the past, if anyone from the lower caste breached the unwritten law of caste hierarchy, the person would be beaten up in public. Now the person will be shot dead and the village burnt down and the women raped. A bridegroom riding a horse during his wedding, an enterprising peasant digging a well on his land, if a boy falls in love with a girl – do you kill them? Yet, if they belong to the Dalit caste they are killed. We still say that there is rule of law in India,” he said in his acceptance speech while receiving the Gwangju Prize for Human Rights.
He is also concerned about the plight of women and children in this country. “India is still very much a patriarchal and caste-based society with gender discrimination. The destructive effects of gender discrimination, patriarchal oppression and the semi-feudal society so prevalent in 21st century India are manifest in our 55 million children, employed at times in subhuman conditions,” he says in a newspaper interview.
Raghuvanshi received the Gwangju Human Rights Award in 2007. He was made an Ashoka Fellow in 2001 and was presented the International Human Rights Prize of the City of Weimar (Germany) in 2010. Raghuvanshi once said to a newspaper that caste discrimination is so rife in Bundelkhand that a Dalit has to take off his chappal and hold it in his hand if a person belonging to the Thakur caste approaches. It’s not something that would make us proud.
Raghuvanshi is the founder of the People’s Vigilance Committee on Human Rights (PVCHR), which fights for the rights of marginalized people in several North Indian states, especially in the area around Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh.
Raghuvanshi was born in an upper caste family, which he describes as “feudal”. He got a bachelor’s degree in ayurveda, modern medicine and surgery from the State Ayurvedic College in Haridwar. But the social inequities that faced India made him take up the cause of bonded labourers. This is when he noticed that not a single bonded labourer came from the upper caste, and realised that the problem was essentially caste.
In 1996, Raghuvanshi founded PVCHR to fight the caste system. He works to ensure basic rights to vulnerable groups like children, women, Dalits, tribes and minorities. Raghuvanshi and his team works at the grassroots level in Varanasi and around 200 villages in Uttar Pradesh and five other states. PVCHR works to eliminate situations that give rise to the exploitation of vulnerable and marginalized groups, and to start a movement for a people-friendly movement (Jan Mitra Samaj) through an inter-institutional approach.
Raghuvanshi has his task cut out for him since the lot of Dalits and other oppressed minorities continues to be dismal. “In the past, if anyone from the lower caste breached the unwritten law of caste hierarchy, the person would be beaten up in public. Now the person will be shot dead and the village burnt down and the women raped. A bridegroom riding a horse during his wedding, an enterprising peasant digging a well on his land, if a boy falls in love with a girl – do you kill them? Yet, if they belong to the Dalit caste they are killed. We still say that there is rule of law in India,” he said in his acceptance speech while receiving the Gwangju Prize for Human Rights.
He is also concerned about the plight of women and children in this country. “India is still very much a patriarchal and caste-based society with gender discrimination. The destructive effects of gender discrimination, patriarchal oppression and the semi-feudal society so prevalent in 21st century India are manifest in our 55 million children, employed at times in subhuman conditions,” he says in a newspaper interview.
Raghuvanshi received the Gwangju Human Rights Award in 2007. He was made an Ashoka Fellow in 2001 and was presented the International Human Rights Prize of the City of Weimar (Germany) in 2010. Raghuvanshi once said to a newspaper that caste discrimination is so rife in Bundelkhand that a Dalit has to take off his chappal and hold it in his hand if a person belonging to the Thakur caste approaches. It’s not something that would make us proud.
How can you Help?
Caste approaches is not something that would make us proud
Contact details of the NGO/Institution
Name : Lenin Raghuvanshi
Email ID : lenin@pvchr.asia
Contact Number : 9935599333
Website : http://www.pvchr.asia
Address : PVCHR Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh
Thursday, January 24, 2013
PVCHR: India: Threats to human rights defenders of PVCHR
PVCHR: India: Threats to human rights defenders of PVCHR ...: http://www.pvchr.asia/?id=138 ………………………………………………………………………………………… Issue: Intimidation, right to life with dignity, threat to human righ...
Therefore, I request that I, my family, Sapna Chaurasia and her family be protected and a probe should be conducted at high level by the CBCID or CBI due to involvement of corrupts in all sectors such as media, police, NGOs, lawyers, relatives etc, because I received many calls and advises from them to withdrawal my petition and support. First time in my life, I am feeling that my death is so near. I believe in life before death like Jesus, so I am going to fight up to my death against corrupt and patriarchal elements. If I will be died, please support to people of PVCHR and provide care to my son. It is my testimony on the birthday of my son Kabeer karunik on 24 January 2013. From testimony of Lenin Raghuvanshi
PVCHR: India: Threats to human rights defenders of PVCHR
PVCHR: India: Threats to human rights defenders of PVCHR ...: http://www.pvchr.asia/?id=138 ………………………………………………………………………………………… Issue: Intimidation, right to life with dignity, threat to human righ...
Therefore, I request that I, my family, Sapna Chaurasia and her family be protected and a probe should be conducted at high level by the CBCID or CBI due to involvement of corrupts in all sectors such as media, police, NGOs, lawyers, relatives etc, because I received many calls and advises from them to withdrawal my petition and support. First time in my life, I am feeling that my death is so near. I believe in life before death like Jesus, so I am going to fight up to my death against corrupt and patriarchal elements. If I will be died, please support to people of PVCHR and provide care to my son. It is my testimony on the birthday of my son Kabeer karunik on 24 January 2013. From testimony of Lenin Raghuvanshi
Monday, January 14, 2013
Thanks to Janab Amitabh Bachchan
Thanks to Janab Amitabh Bachchan ji(http://www.facebook.com/AmitabhBachchan?ref=ts&fref=ts) and Bhashkar Bhatt
for bringing the story of most marginalzed people Musahar."Today
however at the recording of KBC we have had to devote time to a special
programme, on an issue, much like the acid attack victim, which has
been another most painful exercise. I was completely unaware of the
‘Musahars’ - a tribe that exists in the Eastern parts of U.P and bits of
Bihar, that has been declared as the lowest section of society, the
MahaDalits … a Dalit is an untouchable, renamed by Gandhi ji who
completely did not believe in the caste system as Harijans, now known as
Dalits. The ‘musahar’ through past centuries has lived in the worst
kind of squalor and poverty .. have been bonded labor for the land owner
who used them to work in the fields, and horror of horrors, deployed
them to protect the agricultural land from rodents that were destroying
the crops. They were called ‘rat catchers’ in that time and have since
been isolated by society to live in penury in dirt and filth with no
knowledge or idea of what it meant to be living in clean and sanitised
conditions. They were the poorest of the poor and many a times because
of the absence of any kind of food available to them survived by eating
the rats that they killed to protect the crops in the fields. A most
miserable existence, until a retired officer in the police force, gave
them hope a home a clean environment and took on the responsibility of
educating these people, who had never dared to be educated for they knew
that it would not be of any use to them. The literacy quotient within
this community has been 3% , of which for the women it has been 1% !!" :
from Blog of Amitabh Bachchan ji.http://srbachchan.tumblr.com/post/39768406220#disqus_thread
Please see a documentary:
Blog on Musahar:http://musahar.blogspot.in/
Sunday, October 21, 2012
PVCHR: A tale of two villages:a story of Economist
PVCHR: A tale of two villages:a story of Economist: Malnutrition in the area persists, says Lenin Raghuvanshi of a non-governmental organisation in eastern Uttar Pradesh. from the report...
Tuesday, October 09, 2012
PVCHR: Reconciliation to honor the reconciliation movemen...
PVCHR: Reconciliation to honor the reconciliation movemen...: Nobel peace prize should be recognize the Shraman Culture(Culture of inclusiveness),non-violence of Budha and Gandhi ji with non-violen...
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