JOIN USBarbaric bias victimises dalits
Lakshmamma of Bochihalli occasionally cuts the thick, nearly white mop of Narasaiah. Frail and on the threshold of 80, Narasaiah sits on a charpoy, a bedstead of woven hemp stretched on a wooden frame on four legs and Lakshmamma takes a pair of scissors and clips his rough locks. The old woman engages in the task only because the couple lives in Bochihalli.
The village has 40 families, and the local barbers refuse to cut their hair. The dalits are forced to go to Nonavinakere, four km away to a barber who has no such hang-ups.
Narasaiah, too frail and nearly blind to walk the distance, is given a hair cut by a young dalit neighbour, Shekhar, who helps other dalit senior citizens in the village in a similar fashion.
Lakshmamma has stepped in as Shekhar is away in town on an errand. Her only son works in town and sends money to his parents regularly.
As this correspondent was about leave the village, Shekhar returned. Unwilling to talk about the untouchability still rampant in their village, Shekhar timidly told Deccan Herald that the only barber in the village would cut the hair of dalits out of fear of legal action, but would show his reluctance openly, making the dalits avoid the saloon as far as possible.
Only a few months ago, the media came across the story of dalit boys denied a hair cut by a barber at Bisalehalli in the taluk, a somewhat ‘developed’ village.
If such is the plight of dalits in a village where the community has a comparatively high literacy rate, one can only imagine the life of dalits in Bochihalli, where most of them are illiterate and daily wagers.