Orissa Puri Temple Puts a sign board restricting dalits to enter temple
stop at this point. "Harijans can pray from here
Last year in august three schoolgirls entered the shrine to offer Prasad to the Goddess kali an icon of empowerment and Shakti.
After this incident warning sign was put up it reads as follows.
A board outside a temple for the Goddess Kali orders Dalits to stop at this point. "Harijans can pray from here,"
The caretaker of the temple in Orissa's Puri district said that "Our fathers did not allow harijans to step inside the temple, and we will also bar their entry.
We will die rather than let it happen."
It is against tradition.
Chandana Bhoi is one of the young girls who visited the Goddess, triggering a vengeful response. "There should be no discrimination.
We can do the same work as the upper-castes," she says. "We pray to the same Gods, so why are we treated so badly?
Ranapada is home to 80 Dalit families who earn their living as sharecroppers. But since the temple controversy last year, they have been given no work. Upper caste leaders from surrounding villages decided to teach them a lesson. Landlords in the area took back the land given for cultivation to the Dalits.
But the board outside the temple proves that there is little political will in undoing the wrongs inflicted here - or in challenging archaic and illegal conventions rooted in the
caste system. A young couple in their wedding finery crouches outside the temple, seeking the Goddess' blessings, forbidden from drawing any closer. Nobody blinks.
After NDTV showed this story Central government of India has asked the Orissa government to provide more information on why this was not stopped.
Again this proves that caste system in India is same like Racism.
International community should wake up and declare it as the racism Indian style.
What government of Orissa should do in this case?
If the board is their the government should declare the Dalit person as the caretaker of the temple for next 100 years.
If Orissa government fails to do so then one should understand that government want to follow the age old bad traditions and customs to win and get the votes and divide the communities on the name of religion and caste.
In this case do you think that Any person will go to Jail?
The dalits will get compensation for harassment?
Damages for insulting them
