Current Events > Hindu activists succeed in killing anti-Caste discrimination bill in California

(+) Yeah! (+)

I'm confused... is this good or bad?

The HAF is only one of several diaspora groups drawing their battle lines in response to public allegations of caste discrimination in the American workplace, including educational institutions.
Arrayed on the other side of the issue are several Dalit rights organisations, which are vigorously lobbying the state to add caste as a category of potential discrimination under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which currently lists race, colour, religion, sex, or national origin as protected categories. It is only when that happens, they contend, that employers will take the issue of caste discrimination seriously and implement policies to deal with it. CISCO had maintained that they did not act on complaints of caste discrimination because the practice is not unlawful.

The Ambedkar International Center (AIC) has filed an amicus brief in the CISCO case, challenging the HAFs amicus brief, which had argued that the caste system is not part of Hinduism. Several diaspora organisations, including Hindus for Human Rights, have supported the AIC in its effort. The case is still in the courts.

The International Commission for Dalit Rights collaborated with Hindus for Human Rights in preparing an investigative report on caste discrimination in the temple/gurdwara building industry. This was prompted by the highly publicised allegation that the BAPS temple in New Jersey had mistreated its Dalit workers brought in from India. That case is still in the courts.
The Equality Labs (EL) has been at the forefront of the fight on behalf of Dalits and has been lobbying universities to ban discrimination on the basis of caste. Earlier this year, Cal State did just that, over the objections of a section of Indian-Americans who argued that caste discrimination no longer exists and that the universitys move would provoke hate against Hindus on campus.

Those arguments were directly challenged by the ELs caste survey, which found that two out of three Dalits reported being treated unfairly at their American workplace. Also, the experience of Brandeis University, which was the first to ban caste discrimination in 2020, debunked the claim that banning caste discrimination on campus provokes hate against Hindus.

Dalits have not had the same success though in their lobbying efforts with tech giants. Google, under pressure from its large Hindu employee base, cancelled a scheduled workshop earlier this year on caste discrimination. ELs executive director, Thenmozhi Soundararajan, was forced to deliver her planned remarks on the Internet in effect challenging other Google employees to ask themselves what it is in her remarks that so threatened the Google management.

I didn't think ultra conservative Hindis had that kind of political leverage in California.

You would think Hinduism is about being chill. How does the caste system manifest in the US though?

• High caste people generally have more resources so are more likely to be able to come to the US
• High caste people would rather not believe part of their success can be attributed to generational inequality from caste privilege differences (like white conservatives in the US)
• So you end up with a largely Brahmin diaspora in the US, many may not even believe in discrimination or do not believe they participate in it, seeing a law like this as a condemnation of their broader Hindu identity

They say that caste discrimination is already covered by existing laws, but it was clearly an issue if an entirely separate bill had to be created to address it.