New Delhi/Lucknow: The ruling BJP’s so-called “dalit outreach” seems to have got a major setback as several saffron dalit leaders and legislators have come out openly against it.
While BJP dalit leader and Bhairaich MP Savitri Bai Phule called the initiative to reach out to dalits by party leaders as a “fake show” and even predicted it will neither help the party or the government, another dalit MP Udit Raj said dalits need “more than leaders going to their houses to eat”.
Ms Phule had raised a banner of revolt against the “anti-dalit polices” of the Centre after the recent Supreme Court order on the SC/ST Act.
The order was seen by many dalit organisations as dilution of the law, against which they had organised a Bharat Bandh on April 2, that saw violent protests in some parts of the country.
While Dr Raj supported Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s push for a dalit outreach, the Northwest Delhi MP also pointed out that eating at dalits’ homes would not satisfy them as the community was feeling frustrated due to their unfulfilled “aspirations and expectations”.
The BJP had to face massive embarrassment after reports that its UP minister Suresh Rana had feasted at a dalit house where the food was ordered from outside.
Another Uttar Pradesh minister, Anupama Jaiswal, created more embarrassment when she defended her party leaders visiting dalit homes and having dinner there, saying they do so braving “mosquito bites the whole night”.
