Racist and blind to it: Indians face the mirror

RACISM VS CASTEISM: Experts on CNN-IBN say Indians should not confuse racist slurs with caste slurs.

          

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Millions of cricket fans across India are enraged that off-spinner Harbhajan Singh has been accused of racism and banned for three Tests. Fans say there is no evidence against Harbhajan and no Indian can ever be racist.

“India’s national commitment is against racism. Our national struggle is based on values that negate racism,” the Indian cricket board has said while rejecting the allegation against Harbhajan.

But is that always true? Does a radio jockey calling Nepalese chowkidars and spectators teasing Australian all-rounder Andrew Symonds with monkey chants prove that we are racist or is it just the misbehavior of a few Indians? Are Indians unaware of their internal racist bias?

CNN-IBN’s Senior Editor Sagarika Ghose asked this on Face The Nation to Dipankar Gupta, who teaches Sociology at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, Professor Kancha Ilaiah, a Dalit activist and writer, and former cricketer Maninder Singh.

Cultural clash

Australians say ‘b*****d’ is not that offensive to them as ‘monkey’, the slur Harbhajan allegedly used against Symonds.

Indians would regard ‘b*****d’ very insulting but ‘monkey’ not that offensive. So is this controversy merely a play of words or is it a misunderstanding between two cultures?

“A word doesn’t become racist because two people suddenly decided it to be. A word becomes racist because of convention and a large number of people agreed that it was racist. The term ‘Paki’ is racist but Brit is not, the term Caucasian is not racist but the term ‘Negro’ is. Monkey is not a racist term in India,” said Gupta.

However, in the racism allegation against Harbhajan, Ilaiah reminded, “It is important to consider how Andrew Symonds perceived that word.”

“Symonds is a Black and ethnically he has been denied historical rights. He has alleged that he has been called a monkey because he is a Black person. That is very important,” he said.

“In India, Brahminical forces consider ‘Chandala’ as a positive word but Dalits, tribals and other backward classes consider it as completely abusive. Our casteism is transcending into racism,” said Ilaiah.

But is sledging on the cricket field really racism?