The different names reflected the changing politics and where the Scheduled Castes were located in that framework. From the lowly menial she was supposed to be, to being patronised by Gandhi as God’s own, certainly demonstrated this newfound role in the freedom movement, and as part of the emerging entity called India and, eventually, as votes went, an important force to be patronised and developed by parties led by upper caste elites. Reservations mandated by the Constitution then made sure the phrase “Scheduled Caste” or just “SC” came into being. At the time of the Mandal crisis in North India in 1990, the upper middle classes shortened it to a derogatory “sched”. Finally, in 1987, the Indian state decided that even “Harijan” was not politically correct enough.

There was a deep desire with the emergence of a nascent middle class in the community to throw off the patronage offered via “Harijan” and be called just Dalits — “depressed classes”, which is what Ambedkar used to refer to them in his work and in his capacity as chairman of the drafting committee of the Indian Constitution.

So it is not just semantics — being able to cope with calling a spade a spade, just factually describing their plight in a single word, is a signal of the times. Despite its deep divisions, Dalit politics in India today is increasingly being premised on not being just an attachment to someone else’s grand plans to make schools or a few other buildings for them, but on turning themselves collectively into a formidable force, so that others feel compelled to align with them on their terms.

... contd.