(people talking indistinctly)
- [Phillip Martin] On the campus of Brandeis University,
students pour out of classrooms just before noon.
Young women and men in a rich mosaic of skin hues and colors
trudge through light snow
toward their next academic experience.
Like colleges and universities across the US,
these students are protected, at least on paper,
from prejudices that seep in from the off-campus world.
Brandeis has strict prohibitions against racism,
gender inequality and homophobia, among other no-nos.
And soon it may become one of the few universities
in the United States to outlaw caste discrimination.
Professor Larry Simon at Brandeis Heller School,
and an expert on caste, is leading the effort.
- [Larry Simon] We have many students
who come from low-caste backgrounds
and others who come from high-caste
and other backgrounds including Dalits,
and they bring sometimes a sense of privilege
and sometimes a sense of being stigmatized to America,
where caste is not a household word.
- [Phillip Martin] There are nearly three million people
from the Indian subcontinent in America.
About 60,000 Indians live in Massachusetts,
a number dwarfed by Indians
in California, New Jersey and Texas.
High-caste and dominant-caste Indians
make up about 90% of the population,
according to the University of Pennsylvania's Center
for the Advanced Study of India.
Invariably caste arises, says Roger Kumar Komley,
a former chemical engineer in Houston
who worked with a Dalit human rights organization there.
We spoke with Mr. Komley before his death last August.
He recounted the story of a student
who was initially accepted into a PhD science program
at a major research university in the South
and then allegedly rejected by the lab's director.
- [Roger Komley] And the professor was of Indian origin
and he wanted to check on this caste background
of the students whom he was considering for admission.
And the moment he came to know about his caste,
he denied that student, who now completed his studies,
has not decided to go to the court of law.
- [Phillip Martin] But even if he had gone
to a court of law, here's the problem.
- [Kevin Brown] The United States doesn't recognize
the concept of caste, so it's not included
in any of our laws that prohibit discrimination.
- [Phillip Martin] Kevin Brown is a professor
at Indiana University School of Law and an expert on caste.
- [Kevin Brown] We, in the US,
just haven't had as much experience
with problems within the Indian communities
that move to the United States.
So our legal system hasn't caught up to that.
Unfortunately then, there are very little protections
for Dalits in the United States
for the discrimination that they encounter here.
- [Phillip Martin] When caste has been addressed
in US courts, it's either been in the context of immigration
with Dalits seeking asylum based on claims
of political persecution.
Or in one renowned Supreme Court case,
a high-caste Indian asked to be declared white
in order to get citizenship.
The petition was denied.
Caste as a modern-day legal issue
was recently tested in a case in New York.
(Indian music)
That case started here, at this restaurant,
in New York's Curry Hill section called Sahib.
A Dalit waiter alleges that he was humiliated
by the upper-caste managers and staff.
The waiter, who requested his name not be used,
was represented by attorney Swati Sawant.
- [Swati Sawant] They wouldn't eat with him, you know?
This case was denied by
New York State division of human rights.
The reason, because caste is not recognized.
- [Phillip Martin] And because caste is not recognized,
Sawant has taken the case
to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
Sahib's owner telephoned WGBH News from New Jersey
to confirm that a complaint
has been filed against the restaurant.
And says that he will wait for its decision
before issuing a statement.
- [Sahib's Owner] This is a very contentious topic.
- [Phillip Martin] In the Washington DC's headquarters
of the Hindu-American foundation,
I'm here to see executive director, Suhag Shukla.
The HAF says it condemns discrimination across the board,
but believes that what some call caste-ism
may be overblown.
- [Suhag Shukla] Where any sense of hierarchy
and any sort of manifestation of caste
that denies the human dignity, HAF firmly believes
in the annihilation of those types of practices.
But where some sort of caste tradition
might give the people a sense of solidarity,
or a way of relating to one another,
and is a force for good,
I don't know that those types of practices
that are also part of caste practices,
should be annihilated.
- [ Phillip Martin] A survey conducted last year
by Equality Labs, a Dalit research organization,
found that two out of three so-called untouchables
reported being treated unfairly
at their workplace in the US.
And one in three Dalit students
reported being discriminated against.
Twelve hundred South Asians responded to the online survey,
and upper caste critics
attack the report's findings as unscientific.
Thenmozhi Soundararajan, Equality Lab's executive director,
says as more and more Dalits in the United States
open up about their caste identities,
she expects to hear more stories about discrimination.
- [Thenmozhi Soundararajan] Unfortunately for people
who have caste privilege,
we have laws against discrimination
in the United States.
And that's why I think that they're so threatened
by a report like this,
because it finally gives caste-depressed people
a piece of data that can be used to help protect them
where there's been no protections before.
- [Phillip Martin] But protections
are emerging in some places.
Some may see current US laws as protection
against caste discrimination as wishful thinking,
but Brandeis University is trying to make it happen.
Mark Brimhall-Vargas,
Vice President for diversity at Brandeis,
says the school, which was founded as a haven
for Jewish students who faced anti-Semitism
almost everywhere else, will deal with caste bias head on.
- [Mark Brimhall-Vargas] When a university has
a non-discrimination policy, obviously it will contain
protected categories of identities that are prohibited
from discrimination based on federal or state law.
But there are other categories of identity
that are prohibited based only on the will of the campus,
that in this campus community, we shall not discriminate
against certain people.
We're not afraid to be leaders at Brandeis.
- [Phillip Martin] In the fall of 2019,
Brandeis is expected to become the first major university
in America to ban caste-ism.
Phillip Martin, WGBH Boston's local NPR.