The Sting of Untouchability: Kharge’s Humiliation and the Constitution’s Unkept Promise

LEADER OF OPPOSITION in the Rajya Sabha and Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge expressed his deep anguish on August 13, two days before the 80th Independence Day celebrations, that he was made to “feel the sting of untouchability.” These painful utterances were made by him after a “purification” ritual was performed allegedly by some BJP people at the venue in Uttarakhand’s Haldwani where he addressed a public meeting on August 8. 

Untouchability is Contrary to the Vision of Swaraj

It is instructive that during freedom struggle Mahatma Gandhi used to repeatedly assert that the removal of untouchability was an indispensable condition for attaining Swaraj, for he conjured up the vision of Swaraj not just in terms of liberation of India from  British colonial rule but also liberation from the long festering social scourge of untouchability.  

Kharge hails from a Dalit background. So the purification of the site, allegedly by BJP leaders, where he addressed a massive rally smacks of the attempts by them to treat him as an untouchable so that the pollution caused by his presence at the venue would be purified. So, the sting of untouchability he suffered due to this socially retrograde action is certainly the travesty of Swaraj envisioned by Gandhi and the Constitution’s provision under Article 17, which abolishes “untouchability”. The said Article states, ““Untouchability” is abolished and its practice in any form is forbidden. The enforcement of any disability arising out of “Untouchability” shall be an offence punishable in accordance with law.” 

This emancipatory Article which forms part of the fundamental rights chapter of the Constitution discards the “purity-pollution” logic defining an occupation or action. 

As per Anup Michael Salve, who also recently wrote an insightful article for The Leaflet on why civil protection for people of Dalit lineage under Article 17 must be decoupled from the politics of reservation, “this evolving jurisprudence demonstrates that Article 17 is not confined to a single static historical practice but targets the underlying logic of purity and pollution – the structural mechanism used to subordinate, exclude and stigmatise human beings.”

The purification of the venue where Kharge delivered his speech was intended to stigmatise him on account of his caste profile and so the severity of  “the sting of untouchability” inflicted on him deserved to be visited with punishment as per law and statute against those who did the purification. 

Constitution and Social Revolution 

Granville Austin in his book “The Indian Constitution: Cornerstone of a Nation” very thoughtfully observes that “The Indian Constitution is first and foremost a social document.” “The majority of its provisions,” he remarks, “are either directly aimed at furthering the goals of the social revolution or attempt to foster this revolution by establishing the conditions necessary for its achievement… "Yet despite the permeation of the entire constitution by the aim of national renascence, the core of the commitment to the social revolution lies in Parts III and IV, in the Fundamental Rights and in the Directive Principles of State Policy. These are the conscience of the Constitution,” he notes.  

The humiliation heaped on Kharge by that vicious purification ceremony is a negation of the social revolution or the establishing conditions necessary for its achievement. Rather it represented a counter revolution to push back the social revolution that has been going on in our country after the Constitution came into force and B.R. Ambedkar’s ideas remained central to several agitations to carry forward the social revolution. 

Kharge remarked in the Rajya Sabha on August 13 that in his speech at Haldwani he never referred to any community or religion and only reiterated the issues of the BJP government of the state. And yet he said people associated with BJP tried to insult him  by doing a purification ritual which made him feel the sting of untouchability. “Is this the way in a democracy? How are you protecting the constitution?” he asked. 

It was reported in the Times of India that members of Shri Ram Sena Dharmarth Seva Nyas Sangathan did the purification ritual on August 10, by stating that certain slogans raised at Kharge’s August 8 rally “sounded like Islamic slogans.” They very preposterously argued that the Ramlila Ground where Kharge delivered his speech is meant for religious and cultural events and should not be given to political parties, while referring to Kharge’s earlier comments against the BJP and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh.