Dalit History Month: How Caste Shapes Life After Inclusion

In India, where one in six individuals is a Scheduled Caste. Dalit History Month offers, at first glance, a moment of remembrance. It also raises a difficult question: one that asks not only what has been corrected in the long arc of caste-based exclusion, but what continues to endure, often less visibly, within the structures of participation, labour, and everyday social life in India?

Much like the staggered lanes of a relay track, where each runner begins from a different position not by choice but by design, individuals enter social and economic systems already carrying the weight of histories that determine how far they must travel to arrive at what is considered an equal point. Over time, policies such as reservation and affirmative actions have attempted to reduce these distances, to move starting lines closer together, or at least compensate for their unevenness. In measurable terms, these interventions have produced results. The proportion of Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs) in government employment increased from 12.2% in 1990 to 21.9% in 2019. Between 2015 and 2022, enrolment of SC and ST students in higher education rose significantly, with SC students making up 15.3% and ST students 6.3%, together accounting for 21.6% of total enrolment. Female enrolment within the SC category also increased sharply, rising by 51% during this period. For earnings, a report from 2022 indicates that the ‘bottom 50%’ of the Indian population which includes a large share of SC, ST, and OBC groups, has a disproportionately low share of total national income at 13%. Taken together, this evidence shows improved earnings and a gradual, though uneven, entry into the formal sector.

Yet, these shifts in access, when observed more closely, do not settle into a story of transformation. They mark an opening, certainly, but do not mean that Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes have an equal position in the system. Representation has expanded, but it remains uneven, often clustering at the lower tiers of institutional and economic hierarchies. Scheduled Castes, for instance, continue to be overrepresented in low-status and low-paying occupations, such as manual labour and scavenging, while being underrepresented in high-status and high-paying occupations, such as professional and managerial jobs. According to the 2011-12 NSSO data, 63% of SC workers are engaged as wage labourers, with 32% in casual labour—double the national average of 16%. This reflects both economic vulnerability and persistent occupational segmentation that policy alone has not addressed.

The question that emerges here is less about entry and more about placement. If participation does not change the terms on which individuals are incorporated into systems of work and recognition, it risks reshuffling them without altering the structure itself. It is in this space that caste continues to operate through expectations about where one belongs, what one is expected to do, and how that work is valued.

This becomes more legible in moments where formal inclusion meets social resistance. In June 2019, two Scheduled Caste women appointed at an Anganwadi centre in Madurai were transferred shortly after their hiring, following objections from dominant caste groups who claimed that their presence would “pollute the food.” This incident does not reflect a lack of policy; the appointment itself was made possible by it. Rather, it reveals the limits of policy when it encounters forms of social perception that remain largely unaltered. Employment, in this instance, did not secure dignity; it exposed the conditions under which dignity continues to be withheld.

Even in the case of tribal communities, inclusion in economic activities often unfolds alongside processes of marginalisation. The Birhor community, classified as a Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group (PVTG), offers one such case. Their dietary practice of eating monkeys has been met with stigma and exclusion since monkeys are believed to be under the protection of the Hindu God Hanuman. Even as constitutional provisions emphasise their protection and advancement, formal recognition continues to coexist with social distance.

These instances begin to suggest that caste persists not only as a structure of access, but as a structure of perception, one that shapes how individuals are seen even after they have entered spaces from which they were historically excluded. The stigma attached to marginalised communities does not disappear with the entry of the State. It often persists, sometimes subtly, sometimes explicitly, influencing both the opportunities available and the terms on which they are offered. As Dr B.R. Ambedkar had argued, restrictions on occupation do not only limit income but also shape whether employment is possible at all.

What this indicates is that while affirmative policies (such as reservation, political representation, conditional cash transfers and scholarship) have been necessary and useful to a good extent, they have not been sufficient in altering the deeper social relations that govern inclusion. While economic participation has increased, it has not been accompanied by a proportional shift in dignity or recognition. Therefore, the persistence of caste is not simply a failure of policy, but a reminder that policy operates within a social field that does not change at the same pace.

In this context, the ongoing discussions around caste-based enumeration could be seen in a positive light. The absence of updated, disaggregated data has long limited the ability to assess how caste continues to shape outcomes in contemporary India. If conducted with transparency and methodological care, the absence of vote-bank politics, such an exercise could offer a clearer view of not only who participates, but where they are located within systems of work, income, and representation. In doing so, it may allow for a rethinking of policy frameworks that have, over time, become somewhat static, even as the realities they seek to address have evolved.

To conclude, the track may have widened, but the lanes remain staggered in ways that are not always immediately visible and not easily corrected through institutional presence alone. Dalit History Month, in this sense, returns not only as a site of memory, but as a reminder: representation has begun to alter the terms of inclusion, but it is yet to fully unsettle the structures that continue to shape it.