Bill banning caste discrimination in California clears first major hurdle

A invoice that will outlaw caste discrimination within the US state of California has cleared its first huge legislative hurdle.

On Tuesday, the state’s Senate Judiciary Committee voted in favour of the laws, sending it to the subsequent committee for consideration.

If handed, the invoice may make California the primary state within the nation to make caste bias unlawful by including it as a protected class within the state’s anti-discrimination legal guidelines.

State Senator Aisha Wahab, the primary Muslim and Afghan American elected to the state legislature, launched the invoice final month. 

“We’ve hit a nerve and exposed a form of discrimination many never even knew existed,” stated Wahab, D-Hayward, who instructed committee members that she has acquired demise threats after proposing this laws.

“Caste is an invisible shackle placed on people at birth. Those of us not raised in that system can’t possibly understand what it does to one’s psyche, the inter-generational trauma it causes.”

India’s Hindu caste system, which dates again 1000’s of years, divides society right into a inflexible hereditary hierarchy primarily based on a perception in so-called upper-caste purity, with Dalits on the bottom rung going through discrimination and even violence.

Activists say caste-based discrimination has adopted the South Asian diaspora to the United States.

Caste is a division of individuals associated to beginning or descent and people on the lowest strata of the caste system, often known as Dalits, have been pushing for authorized protections in California and past.

References to a societal hierarchy could be discovered within the millennia-old Hindu textual content Rig Veda, the place a hymn describes the origin of all life from the Purusha or “supreme being.” 

A verse states that the 4 classes [varnas] of Hindu society got here from this infinite being. The Brahmins [priest class] appeared from the being’s head, the Kshatriyas [warriors] from his arms, the Vaishyas [business class] from his thighs and the Shudras [labourers] from his ft. 

Those who have been exterior the system turned often known as the outcasts or untouchables, and later because the Dalits.

The varna system initially served to categorise people on the idea of their attributes and aptitude. However, with time, it advanced into the caste system the place an individual’s occupation and standing in society turned decided by beginning.

READ MORE: California could develop into first US state to outlaw caste discrimination

Caste discrimination in US firms

Supporters of the invoice say it’s crucial to guard Dalits from bias in housing, schooling and within the tech sector — the place they maintain key roles.

Opponents known as the proposed laws “unconstitutional” and stated it could unfairly goal Hindus and other people of Indian descent. 

Wahab asserted on Tuesday that the invoice “does not target any specific community or religion.”

A United Nations report in 2016 stated not less than 250 million individuals worldwide nonetheless face caste discrimination in Asia, Africa, the Middle East and Pacific areas, in addition to in varied diaspora communities.

According to a 2021 report by the Silicon Valley Institute for Regional Studies, Asians, together with South Asians, maintain 37.8 % of technical roles and 25.3 % of management roles at Silicon Valley’s largest tech firms.

In 2020, California regulators sued Cisco Systems saying a Dalit Indian engineer confronted caste discrimination on the firm’s Silicon Valley headquarters. 

In one other case, Tanuja Gupta, give up her senior supervisor job at Google News final 12 months after blowback over inviting Thenmozhi Soundararajan, founder and government director of Oakland, California-based Equality Labs, a Dalit advocacy group, to talk to staff throughout April, which is Dalit History Month. 

The discuss was canceled and Gupta accused her former employer of retaliation, which Google has denied.

Dalits being handled ‘unfairly’

Rakhi Israni, an legal professional and California resident, who testified earlier than the committee stated the laws is an “unconstitutional denial of my community’s rights to fairness and equal protection under the law.”

“If this bill is adopted, caste will be the only discrimination law category that is not facially neutral,” she stated. 

Ann Ravel, who served on the Federal Election Commission beneath president Barack Obama, testified that she views this invoice and the motion to finish caste discrimination “as an important civil rights issue.”

“Unless caste is explicitly added [as a protected category], it will be very difficult for those who have been discriminated against to seek legal remedy,” she stated.

A 2020 survey of Indian Americans by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace discovered caste discrimination was reported by 5 % of survey respondents.

While 53 % of foreign-born Hindu Indian Americans stated they affiliate with a caste group, solely 34 % of US-born Hindu Indian Americans stated they do the identical.

However, a 2016 Equality Labs survey of 1,500 South Asians within the US confirmed 67 % of Dalits who responded reported being handled unfairly due to their caste.

Committee members stated they understood opponents’ considerations, however are inclined to maneuver the laws alongside as a result of they consider it can assist forestall such discrimination.

The invoice acquired bipartisan help on the committee.

Next, the laws will transfer to the Senate Appropriations Committee for consideration.

In February, Seattle turned the primary US metropolis and jurisdiction exterior South Asia so as to add caste to its anti-discrimination legal guidelines.

READ MORE: Seattle turns into first US metropolis to ban caste discrimination

Source: AP