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School girl sexually assaulted – The hindu
http://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/chennai/school-girl-sexually-assaulted/article8391123.ece
Dalit girl sexually assaulted by four member gang including two minors – The news minut
http://www.thenewsminute.com/article/dalit-girl-sexually-assaulted-teenagers-including-two-minors-40720
Four more held for double murder – The hindu
http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/tamil-nadu/four-more-held-for-double-murder/article8391363.ece
Dalit youth murder: Kowsalya’s uncle held – Nyoooz
http://www.nyoooz.com/coimbatore/401675/dalit-youth-murder58-kowsalyas-uncle-held
Officials take 25 Dalits into temple – The hindu
http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/karnataka/officials-take-25-dalits-into-temple/article8391075.ece
Online: Where friends are made, caste roots struck – The times of india
http://blogs.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tracking-indian-communities/online-where-friends-are-made-caste-roots-struck/
Should ‘gruesome’ images be shared? Yes. – Sifi news
http://www.sify.com/news/should-gruesome-images-be-shared-yes-news-columns-qdyhLPfchidic.html
Kanhaiya demands ‘Rohit Act’ to help Dalit students – Business line
http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/news/national/kanhaiya-demands-rohit-act-to-help-dalit-students/article8390283.ece
Tribal people protest against Maoist killings – The hindu
http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-andhrapradesh/tribal-people-protest-against-maoist-killings/article8390906.ece
Nine months after attack, Dalits of Samastipur wait for justice while accused roam freely – Two circles .net
http://twocircles.net/2016mar23/1458722928.html#.VvNoZrvPouw
Telangana to acquire 10,000 acres of land for SCs – The hindu
http://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Hyderabad/state-to-acquire-10000-acres-of-land-for-sc-families/article8390976.ece
Leading Native Interest Groups Must Step up on Dismemberment – Indian country
http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2016/03/23/leading-native-interest-groups-must-step-dismemberment
Please Watch:
Police BRUTALITY Against Students Caught On Camera : Hyderabad Protests Violence
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_JCOhqRCWeA
Kanhaiya Kumar Slams Smriti Irani and Bandaru Dattatreya | Rohith Vemula Suciide Issue | 10TV
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFtvstC7QLQ
The hindu
School girl sexually assaulted
http://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/chennai/school-girl-sexually-assaulted/article8391123.ece
A Dalit minor was allegedly sexually assaulted by a four-member gang, all teenagers, near Maraimalainagar on Tuesday . The victim was tricked and taken to an isolated place on Tuesday evening and sexually abused by the suspects till noon the next day. She informed her parents who lodged a complaint, police said on Wednesday.
The ninth standard student was walking to her home in Kavanoor when two suspects who came on a motorcycle informed that her father was very sick and offered to take her to the hospital. When she accompanied them, they took her to an abandoned motor room in a farm and assaulted her. Two others joined them in the night. Two of the accused were juveniles, sources said, adding that a special team was formed to apprehend the gang.
The news minut
Dalit girl sexually assaulted by four member gang including two minors
http://www.thenewsminute.com/article/dalit-girl-sexually-assaulted-teenagers-including-two-minors-40720
A Dalit minor was allegedly sexually assaulted by a four-member gang, all teenagers, near Maraimalainagar on Tuesday.
The Hindu reports that the victim was tricked and taken to an isolated place and sexually abused by the suspects till noon the next day.
The ninth standard student was walking to her home in Kavanoor when two suspects who came on a motorcycle informed that her father was very sick and offered to take her to the hospital.
When she accompanied them, they took her to an abandoned motor room in a farm and assaulted her. Two others joined them in the night.
Two of the accused were juveniles, sources said, adding that a special team was formed to apprehend the gang.
The hindu
Four more held for double murder
http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/tamil-nadu/four-more-held-for-double-murder/article8391363.ece
Twenty persons accused in the double murder near Pazhayakayal have so far been taken into custody, according to Superintendent of Police Ashwin M. Kotnis. While six of them were arrested by the police, 14 others surrendered in different courts.
He also dismissed the allegation that Dalit youths were in illegal custody in connection with the murder case.
An advocate and human rights activist, E. Athisiyakumar of Thoothukudi, on Wednesday alleged that many Dalit youths were taken into illegal custody by the police under the pretext of interrogation in the double murder that occurred in a farm of Subash Pannaiyar, president, All India Nadar Padhukappu Peravai, near Pazhayakayal on March 8.
He alleged that the youths, who were in no way connected with the double murder, were kept in illegal custody in the shooting range at Vallanadu and tortured.
Mr. Kotnis denied the allegation, and said that four persons accused in the double murder case were taken into custody on Tuesday and, after interrogation, lodged in prison.
Nyoooz
Dalit youth murder: Kowsalya’s uncle held
http://www.nyoooz.com/coimbatore/401675/dalit-youth-murder58-kowsalyas-uncle-held
Summary: “It was Pandithurai who first questioned why they shouldn’t murder Kowsalya. “However, when Kowsalya stood her ground and refused to separate from Shankar, Pandithurai got angry. Only after a through probe we will be able to establish the role played by each of the accused,” the police officer said.
Pandithurai told us that he could not bear to see his sister suffering and hence suggested that they murder Kowsalya and Shankar,” said a police officer. COIMBATORE: The police have arrested the maternal uncle of Kowsalya from his hideout near Dindigul on Tuesday, for the murder of her dalit husband.Investigations have revealed that it was Pandithurai, 49, a resident of RM Colony in Dindigul who instigated Kowsalya’s family to murder her husband Shankar.
COIMBATORE: The police have arrested the maternal uncle of Kowsalya from his hideout near Dindigul on Tuesday, for the murder of her dalit husband.Investigations have revealed that it was Pandithurai, 49, a resident of RM Colony in Dindigul who instigated Kowsalya’s family to murder her husband Shankar.
Pandithurai is the brother of Kowslya’s mother Annalakshmi, who is still absconding. “It was Pandithurai who first questioned why they shouldn’t murder Kowsalya.
He also played an important role in the conspiracy thereafter,” said a police officer.Pandithurai had also allegedly admitted to the police that they in fact wanted to murder Kowsalya as she had brought ‘shame’ to the family.According to police, Pandithurai couldn’t digest seeing his sister Annalakshi heart broken after Kowsalya married Shankar against the family’s wishes. He made several attempts to convince Kowsalya to part ways with Shankar and return to their family. “However, when Kowsalya stood her ground and refused to separate from Shankar, Pandithurai got angry.
The hindu
Officials take 25 Dalits into temple
http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/karnataka/officials-take-25-dalits-into-temple/article8391075.ece
In a shocking incident, the priest of Kariyamma temple in Araskere taluk is refusing to conduct puja and has locked up the temple after officials of the Hassan district administration took around 25 Dalits into the temple on Tuesday evening, amid opposition from people belonging to ‘upper’ castes. Dalits have always been barred from entering the Muzrai temple.
The Dalits entered the temple in the presence of Assistant Commissioner E. Vijaya, Arasikere tahsildar N.V. Natesh, and other officials.
The officials had earlier held a meeting in the village to resolve the issue. However, very few people from the upper caste attended the meeting. Mr. Natesh, told The Hindu, “We took around 25 people into the temple. For the moment, we have resolved the issue.”
Recently, a few Dalit youths had submitted a memorandum to the Hassan district administration, complaining that they had been discriminated against, during preparations for the Kariyamma Jatra Mahotsav to be held on April 1, besides being denied entry into the temple. Kiran Arakere, a postgraduate student from the village, had submitted the memorandum.
The officials are ready to provide full cooperation to the villagers if they wish to hold the festival. “It is now left to the people,” said the tahsildar.
Dalit youths had recently complained of discrimination during festival preparations
The times of india
Online: Where friends are made, caste roots struck
http://blogs.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tracking-indian-communities/online-where-friends-are-made-caste-roots-struck/
Post defending killing of Dalit youth drew fire on FB; study charts caste identities in social media.
Tradition and modernity. If only they could be kept in neat little boxes to avoid messy tangles. Rajeev, a youngster from a far-flung Chennai suburb, is trying to balance both worlds by juggling two Facebook profiles. One is for his engineering college buddies, and the other to fraternise with kin from his caste. The twain shall never meet if he has his way . “I don’t want my college friends to know that I am so involved in my caste,“ says Rajeev.
At the same time, Rajeev wants to avoid his caste brethren from prying into his secular identity, where he might have “lower social status people“ friends. This way, he feels that he keeps both parties happy .
Virtual lives remain as intricate as those in the real world. Caste pops up in myriad ways online -from closed groups that celebrate nostalgia and glories of the past to curious double lives of people like Rajeev, who most often come from rapidly urbanising areas. The more brazen users of the lot might proclaim that there is no such thing as honour killing, and deny Dalit youth V Sankar’s murder, the latest such case in Tamil Nadu. The timid and the confused majority join closed groups and pray that their double life is not found out by both sets of ‘friends’.
“Many think that this is the right thing to do to avert caste problems.While this sounds like a great strategy to follow, it actually indicates identity confusion,” says researcher Shriram Venkatraman, who came across many such cases in Rajeev’s village and surrounding areas. Caste and family identities have got a boost with rising use of social media apps by smartphone users, even in villages. As part of the ethnographic study , “Why We Post” by anthropologists from University College London, Venkatraman picked an “unusual site” on Chennai’s outskirts that has a cluster of villages and an IT complex, which has more than two lakh employees.
The idea was to study both populations, and also the growing equality of access brought in by smartphone usage. He found that both the IT worker and the farmer remained preoccupied with questions of caste and their south Indian identity online too. “The world that they live in isn’t be reft of any of these.They just continue it on social media, which is nothing but a continuing space of actual lives,” he says.
But it isn’t easy if you want to have best of both worlds, like Rajeev. He feels uneasy about advocating a narrow, communal agenda at one place while acting ‘modern’ at the other. “He is stuck between his loyalty to his kinsmen and to his friends. But like many youngsters he knows how to mediate his way through both structures with care,” says Venkatraman.
There are those who go to extremes online. Like the Villupuram based advocate T S Arunkumar, who congratulated Sankar’s killers and offered free legal aid to the accused.
“It was an open declaration and was removed only after people com plained. This kind plained. This kind of hate speech in the name of free speech has been happening more over the past three years,” says Dalit leader D Ravikumar. Many such groups came into prominence in Tamil Nadu after Dalit youth Ilavarasan’s murder in 2013 and the violent politicisation of such conflicts by parties, he says.
“We thought new methods of communication will empower; instead they are being abused. There should be laws to deal with such hate speech while sensitising people about social media and internet,“ says Ravikumar.
Online caste groups aren’t a new phenomenon. They were there in Yahoo groups in the 1990s, and flourished with Orkut’s arrival in 2004. A 2010 analysis shows that there were more than 100 caste-based communities on Orkut. “Six years ago, we found that more than 60% of the group members were highly educated people. Most of them were graduates or engineering students who joined groups like Brahmins, Dalits, or engineers against reservation,” recalls Mumbai-based social science researcher Sunil Gangavane.
Digital penetration was still limited to those who could afford broadband or data charges. People had by then warmed up to the idea that they had the opportunity to craft their own virtual identities. “You could do things that are not generally allowed and choose whom to be friends with or to share your photographs with.Young people were discovering taboo topics like caste, which are not discussed in public,” says Gangavane.
When Facebook became popular, these groups, too, migrated. “A subset of it is there on WhatsApp,” says Venkatraman. You need to be invited to most such groups, especially on Whatsapp.
The groups come in all shades, from subsets of major religions to clans from a particular area. For instance, there is Trivandrum Nairs and Kongu Nattu Gounder and Goundachi, apart from groups with suffixes such as ‘international forums’ and ‘protection groups’. Discussions involve history of the caste, the place of origin, rituals, gods, place of origin, rituals, gods, festivals and how to reclaim their identity. Some also discuss the societal changes and their effect on a caste, irritation over youngsters who ignore traditions, and occasional bashing of other groups.
In rural areas, this s activity is predominantly driven by men who fear that smartphones in women’s hands could lead to `friendship’ with those from lower castes. Rajah, a 22-year-old computer science student from the Chennai suburb, is always signed onto Facebook but not his sister, who studies in the same college as he does.
“His reasons for keeping her out from the ‘clutches’ of social media is related to the discourses on `ideal Tamil women’. He has several women college mates as friends but they all come from the city ,“ says Venkatra man. The popularity of such groups among youngsters means that they are increasingly being shaped by narrow agendas and concerns expressed by fellow members.
Rajeev, for all his deft handling of social media, knows he might have to choose one over the other in the future. When Venkatraman asked him which of the two profiles will last, he said the “secular“ one as he plans to move out of the village for a job. But then again, he might keep both, he adds as an afterthought. One gives him a ready made identity and sense of rootedness, the other gives a wider network of friends and a politically correct image.
Who says you can’t have it all.
Sifi news
Should ‘gruesome’ images be shared? Yes.
http://www.sify.com/news/should-gruesome-images-be-shared-yes-news-columns-qdyhLPfchidic.html
Questions of the ethics of representation re-emerged around the images of the recent lynching and hanging of two Muslim boys in Latehar and an unmarked video entitled ‘Upper caste women strip Dalit women.’ Academics have been talking about the need not to see or circulate the images of the two Muslim bodies; journalists have been exhorting people not to share the video as the victims’ faces have not been blurred. What would the blurring of the faces of the Dalit women change? What would not showing the dead bodies of the Muslims achieve? Public stripping and parading of Dalits has been and continues to be a cherished practice among upper castes. Why must we invisibilise this violence? Why must we not see the naked brutality of this public humiliation of Dalits?
Recently, Dalits stripped off their own clothes in protest and Meitei women did it in 2004 to protest army atrocities in Manipur. In neither case did the people involve want their faces blurred. Why must we not see the brutality of the dead and contorted body of a young Muslim man, almost boy? Why must we not see Muslim bodies hanging from a tree? In our age of phone cameras, when everything can be captured, isn’t it all the more important to see the faces of the oppressors as much as the oppressed? Isn’t that how the Delhi lawyers who beat up a boy in the court premises at Patiala House in New Delhi were caught? Of course, different meanings will accrue to these images. To some, they might be a cause for celebration; to others a cause for mourning. We cannot dictate how these images are read or experienced by different people. On what grounds might we legislate that certain images not be seen at all? By keeping these images away from the public, are we not re-invisibilising the pain and suffering of marginalised groups like Dalits and Muslims? The middle class does not want to see these images; they do not want to be upset.
They claim to want to protect the dignity and integrity of those stripped and killed. But isn’t the real crime that they have done nothing to stop these things from happening in the first place? Isn’t that far more important than objecting to images bearing testimony to the fact that these things do frequently happen in our contexts? What these images do is to rent, however temporarily, the fabric that invisibilises this violence which is an everyday reality for the poor and marginalised among these groups. We need to have more of these images to remind us what we are capable of, what we do to each other on a daily basis and what our violent and murderous republic is all about. The argument that such images render us immune to human suffering is absurd. If that were true, why would there be any outrage at all. 24×7 news channels shows us much worse on a daily basis; popular cinema in all the major languages show us worse on a weekly basis. Glossy violence is perfectly acceptable to us; cinematic rape is the staple of our fantasies.
But the grittiness and realism of the images of the Muslim boys and the horror of women stripping Dalit women is something we refuse to accept. Our squeamishness over these images conceals a far nastier truth. The fact is that we enjoy these images; we get voyeuristic pleasure out of them. Secretly, we love seeing Dalit women stripped; we gloat over dead Muslim bodies. These images lay bare the relationship between our sexual and bodily desires and the polis or the state. It becomes clear to us why the Army goes for Kashmiri men’s genitalia first while torturing them. It becomes clear to us why riots involve rape as humiliation and conquest. Our sexual lives, like our political lives, are rotten to the core. But we do not want anyone to rub that in our faces.
Business line
Kanhaiya demands ‘Rohit Act’ to help Dalit students
http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/news/national/kanhaiya-demands-rohit-act-to-help-dalit-students/article8390283.ece
JNU Students’ Union (JNUSU) president Kanhaiya Kumar said on Wednesday the fight for protection of democracy will continue.
Addressing students at the main gate of the University of Hyderabad after he was denied permission to enter the campus, he said there is no social justice in the country, and the government cannot oppress dissent by sheer force.
He also demanded the enhancement of a ‘Rohit Act’ for the protection of Dalit students in universities across the country. Kumar was originally scheduled to address the students in the university campus in a condolence meeting for Dalit PhD scholar Rohti Vemula, who committed suicide in a campus hostel in January.
“We will continue to fight for the protection of democracy and realise the dreams of Vemula,” he said while invoking Dr Ambedkar and Bhagat Singh as inspiration for the struggle.
CPI secretary Narayana, who received Kumar at the airport and accompanied him to the university, claimed that the Centre is afraid of increasing opposition to its “oppressive” policies. Meanwhile, tension prevailed in the campus with Vemula’s mother Radhika staging a protest, demanding action against Vice Chancellor P Appa Rao.
The university has suspended classes from March 23 to March 26, and barred the entry of media personnel, political groups, external student organisations and politicians. Appa Rao convened a meeting with about 200 members, Hyderabad University said in a release, adding: “The faculty unanimously condemned the false propaganda of branding the teachers as casteist.”
A representation signed by 34 faculty members had also asked the VC to “remove himself” from the campus.
Appa Rao had gone on long leave after Vemula committed suicide.
The hindu
Tribal people protest against Maoist killings
http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/tp-andhrapradesh/tribal-people-protest-against-maoist-killings/article8390906.ece
In protest against the gunning down of Koosuru Venkata Rao, a tribal farm labour by CPI (Maoists) of Koraput Division on the intervening night of March 21/22, tribals from various sub-plan mandals in the Agency staged a dharna and rasta roko at Parvathipuram RTC Complex on Wednesday. They raised slogans against CPI (Maoists) and advised them not to target innocent tribals in the name of police informers. They also demanded the government to assist families of tribals who have lost their lives at the hands of Maoists.
Meanwhile, Koosuru Lakshmi, wife of the slained Venkata Rao of Jakaravalasa in Kurukutti panchayat in Salur mandal, in a memorandum submitted to Salur Tehsildar, said that as part of guarding maize crop at a farm in the panchayat they slept in the open on the night of March 21 when some men in uniform escorted her husband and gunned him down suspecting him as a police informer.
Two circles .net
Nine months after attack, Dalits of Samastipur wait for justice while accused roam freely
http://twocircles.net/2016mar23/1458722928.html#.VvNoZrvPouw
New Delhi: In June 2015, the weather in Bihar had turned for the worse: intermittent showers were a small comfort from the blazing sun: but for the 300-odd residents of Mirzapur, (Police Station Patori, District Samastipur, Bihar), this was a month where things went from bad to worse and all because they staked claim over what was theirs: land, that was coveted by the Rajputs of the area. This case was one of the 20 cases of atrocities against Dalits that were presented before a tribunal, organised by the National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights (NCDHR) along with National Movement for Dalit Justice (NMDJ)
The story of this incident, like almost all caste-related issues in Bihar, has its origin in tensions related to land issues and the control exercised by the upper castes in the area. Like most villages of Bihar, the majority of the land in the area near the Mirzapur village is controlled by Rajputs. A pond, which covers about seven acres, is dotted by Dushadhs (Schedule Caste) families. The 200 families have been living near the pond for the past 70 years. However, earlier in the month, the Rajputs, which number about 300 families, asked the families to vacate the land, saying that the land belonged to a dominant land lord Tribhuvan Singh of District Vaishali. After the SC families refused to yield, the Rajputs decided to take matters in their own hand.
On June 23, just as the sun was about to rise; the Rajputs, numbering around 300, attacked the village. Firing over 200 rounds, the Rajputs attacked the inhabitants, looting all their possessions and injuring dozens in the process. One person, Rambhagat Paswan, recounted the ordeal while talking to Twocircles.net. “It was chaos everywhere: children, senior citizens, women, men were all running like mad: women were particularly attacked, their clothes torn by upper-caste men. I was shot in my left shoulder and my mother-in-law, who is a senior citizen, suffered so bad in the incident that she passed away a month later,” he says, barely able to hold his tears. “My daughter got lost for three days. All this happened because the land, which is ours, was wanted by the Rajputs,” he adds.
Paswan also says that the police, although aware of the tensions, did little about it. “Nearly two hours after all our houses were destroyed and our meagre possessions had been looted, the police came to ‘investigate’ the matter. How is that ordinary citizens own so much ammunition to shoot more than 200 rounds of bullets?” he asked. By the time dawn had broken out, 25 houses had been completely damaged, along with cycles, and the seven hand pumps around the village. The night was spent in the open, with almost zero food and water. Paswan’s wife, who had accompanied him to the Tribunal, said her mother suffered massive injuries. “We had to take her to a private clinic, where she passed away after battling for a month. We received no compensation from the government,” she added.
It was not as if the Rajput attackers were done: the following night, they attacked again to ensure that the message was delivered to the Dusadhs of the area: leave, else the attacks will continue. On the night of 24th also, the same procedure was once again followed: the police watched, while the upper-caste men went on a rampage.
The Jury, which heard the pleas of the members of the village, believes that the central issue in the case in the ownership of land. Ruth Manorama, who was one of the jury members, asked the villagers to file for ownership of the land, since the Rajputs claim it to be theirs. However, as documents produced by the Circle Officer Indradev Pandit show, the disputed land is government mad and there is no record of this piece of land being owned by the accused Rajputs. Speaking to Twocircles.net, Ruth Manorama, social activist and President, National Association of Women and one of the jury members, said, “Since they have been here for more than 12 years, they can claim ownership of the land. It is government land and not the property of the Rajputs, so once they claim ownership, the disputes will hopefully end,” she said. She further added that the land needs to be developed from the money allotted under the Schedule Caste Sub Plan, and that they must be provided housing under the Indira Awas Yojana.
Since the incident, however, the lives of the SC families have taken a turn for the worse: the accused remain free, while the SC families continue to live in fear. “More than nine months have passed, but there has been no action against the accused,” says Paswan. “Instead, the Rajputs have filed a case against us for rioting in Hajipur against us,” he added.
The police’s actions too have left a lot to be desired: the demands for a local police picket have been ignored. “How have they not manage to file even a charge sheet against eh accused after all this while? We received zero assistance from the government. Let alone houses, we did not even get food,” said Paswan.
The hindu
Telangana to acquire 10,000 acres of land for SCs
http://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Hyderabad/state-to-acquire-10000-acres-of-land-for-sc-families/article8390976.ece
The Telangana government has proposed to purchase 10,000 acres of land for distribution to 3,350 landless Scheduled Caste families with an outlay of Rs. 600 crore in 2016-17 though the performance on the front was not encouraging in the last two years.
It was the election promise of TRS to distribute three acres of land to poor SCs and accompanying investment to make it productive for a period of one year. The party also promised that it would spend Rs.
50,000 crore for the economic development of SCs over five years. However, only 638 families out of the targeted 6,000 in the first year and 1,704 out of 3,334 in the second year benefited from the scheme. The government spent Rs. 258 crore.
The outcome budget presented to the Assembly by SCs development Minister G. Jagadish Reddy talked about land purchase schemes being the main focus of the annual action plan under SC sub-plan for 2016-17 as the SCs in Telangana mostly depended on land and agriculture for livelihood.
The poorest of poor SC women who are absolutely landless agricultural families will be given up to three acres and other SCs who have small holdings from half acre to two acres will be provided balance land to make it three acres.
The scheme will be implemented with 100 per cent subsidy without any contribution from beneficiaries and bank linkages.
A comprehensive package was envisaged to include provision of irrigation and drip facilities, seed, cost of cultivation, fertilizer, pesticides, ploughing, micro irrigation and energisation of pumpsets for one crop year in addition to providing funds for land development and preparation of nurseries.
Telangana has SC population of 54.09 lakh out of the total population of 3.48 crore (15.54 per cent) as per 2011 census.
Indian country
Leading Native Interest Groups Must Step up on Dismemberment
http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2016/03/23/leading-native-interest-groups-must-step-dismemberment
Open letter to the leaders of the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI), Native American Rights Fund (NARF), and National Indian Gaming Association (NIGA):
Dear Native Leaders,
Each of your organizations, founded at critical moments in native history–NCAI in 1944, NARF in 1970, and NIGA in 1985– have and continue to play vital roles in the political, legal, and economic development of Native nations. I write you all now to request that you continue to remain vital and relevant by taking an unequivocal stand against spurious disenrollment practices that destroy the human and civil rights of individual native citizens and threaten the sovereign powers of all Native nations.
NCAI is the largest (over 250 member nations) and one of the oldest interest groups representing indigenous peoples. The organization was born during the turbulent period when the federal government was aggressively moving to politically and legally terminate over 100 tribal nations. NCAI fought against giving state governments’ greater jurisdiction over tribal peoples and their resources, and fought against relocation policies that compelled thousands of tribal citizens off their homelands and into major urban areas.
NARF was one of the first native legal interest groups established in 1970 at the start of the native self-determination era, staffed by hardworking and earnest native and non-native lawyers and other legal professionals with the critical mission of assisting indigenous peoples recover and enforce their sovereignty, defend and enhance treaty rights, and hold the federal government accountable to its trust obligations to Native peoples.
NIGA was formed in 1985 in anticipation of the economic opportunities that the early gaming operations might provide for native communities who were desperately looking for alternative economic means to produce revenue that was not dependent upon federal lawmakers.
There are, of course, dozens of other native interest groups that focus on any number of critical issues vital to indigenous peoples– the Indian Child Welfare Association, The National Indian Education Association, the International Indian Treaty Council, The Native American Journalists Association, The Council of Energy Resource Tribes, and the Native American Indian Court Judges Association– and while each of these groups do important work, your three organizations, both because of the subject matters you address and range of indigenous peoples you affect are the prime bodies wielding significant influence in Indian Country and beyond.
As we all by now, more than 70 native governments located within the boundaries of 20 states have already or are in the process of dismembering their communities by banishing, disenrolling, or denying citizenship to several thousand native citizens. Evidence gathered over the last 20 years strongly indicates that the overwhelming numbers of these actions have been politically and/or economically motivated.
If this is the case in any of these instances, such actions violate the human and civil rights of those individual native citizens and put all Native nations at risk. At the very least, even the suspicion of such violations should be addressed before the matter is taken away from us and we are forced to accept a resolution from the federal government that not of our choosing.
To avoid yet another sovereignty-diminishing decision, it is incumbent upon our accepted pan-national leadership to tackle this issue without delay. We certainly have the capacity to comprehend that protecting the rights of both individual tribal citizens and their Native nations are not only possible, but are, indeed, two sides of the same sovereign coin. Our political, legal, and economic leaders must finally step forward with swift, decisive actions to identify the tribal governments that have acted in illegal and unethical ways as well as to exonerate those who have undertaken these grave actions for legitimate reasons. It is critical that they also provide the same for tribal citizens so that bonafide citizens may finally go on with their lives secure in their fundamental political liberty as Native citizens.
To date, I am not aware of any official, public stance taken by any of your organizations in response to political, legal, and cultural terminations of native citizen rights that threatens all Native people’s sovereign existence. I call upon you to act, following the outstanding examples of the National Native American Bar Association and the Association of American Indian Physicians, to enact strong resolutions that urge tribal political leaders to reconsider disenrollment policies.
Last year these organizations took a clear stand because it had become blatantly apparent that the consequences of statelessness—the horrific mental, physical, and economic consequences that result when citizens are robbed of their identities, health care, and access to justice—go beyond individual suffering to ultimately cause deep, abiding damage to all of Indian Country.
Each of your mission statements tout your core commitments to the pursuit of sound ethical policies grounded in traditional values, such as kinship. Each one of your organizations has certainly demonstrated that commitment in response to outside threats or when attempting to right past wrongs done by outside abusers, such as state officials and the federal agencies.
I have read many variations of statements that implore your members to protect and enhance their citizens’ membership rights based on the sense of belonging to a Native nation—a powerful and organic psychological bond that joins the people and differentiates them from all other peoples—which is at the heart of what it means to be indigenous.
The preamble to NCAI’s Constitution declares that “we, the members of Indian and Alaska Native Tribes … in order to secure to ourselves and our descendants the rights and benefits of traditional laws of our people to which we are entitled as sovereign nations … to promote the common welfare of the American Indian and Alaska Natives …. do establish this organization….”
The “traditional laws” of virtually every Native nation embraced and welcomed a diverse citizenry and protected the sovereign autonomy of every soul in the community. And the term “common welfare” is an all-encompassing phrase that ensures the rights and integrity of every member of the community.
And NARF leaders, your organization specifies five broad principles that you aspire to fulfill: 1) preserve tribal existence; 2) protect tribal natural resources; 3) promote Native American human rights; 4) hold governments accountable to Native peoples; and 5) develop Indian law and educate the public about Indian rights, laws, and issues.
There is no question in my mind that each of these core principles naturally and emphatically embraces those suffering because of our own tribal dismemberment policies. How can you claim to be “preserving tribal existence” if you choose to ignore the political and cultural citizenship rights of every bona fide tribal member and ultimately the threat to sovereign rights of individuals and nations?
We frequently hear that our children are sacred and that they are our greatest natural resource. If that is true, then why are you not offering your services to protect the rights of the many native children who have been or are facing disenrollment? Promoting human rights? What better way to do that than by standing beside those who have been culturally and politically terminated by their government when the preponderance of evidence shows the charges are likely false or trumped up?
Those targeted for disenrollment have sometimes been denied due process and equal protection of the law and have struggled to find, much less be able to afford, competent legal representation. Galanda-Broadman, a private, native-owned firm, has taken on some clients in the Pacific Northwest—the Nooksack 306 and some Grand Ronde members–but NARF, as a leader in the field and a large team of attorneys, should be working hard to make sure that those facing dismemberment receive all the due process safeguards every individual is entitled to.
Finally, to the leaders of NIGA. Your organization consists of 184 Native nations, along with other individuals and businesses. In the minds of many, gambling revenue is viewed as the chief catalyst not only for the powerful economic recovery taking place in many native communities, but also as the dominant factor that has propelled dozens of tribal nations to cast out otherwise legitimate citizens. Some have alleged that it’s simple arithmetic—the fewer members, the greater the per capita payment for those remaining in the nation.
There are many forces outside Indian Country actively working to discredit and dismantle the powerful economic engines that many tribal nations have become. Accountability is therefore critical. If you don’t take a stand against tribal corruption, wherever it exists, then the nations you represent become vulnerable to those who would like to end or at least dramatically diminish tribal economic and political power. Silence jeopardizes the system that has allowed so many of our nations to move beyond simple survival to revive and thrive.
Our nations are at a profound crossroads. In some respects we have made tremendous strides in recovering and exercising greater chunks of substantive authority. We are taking significant steps to revitalize and strengthen our languages, are doing a much better job protecting our children, and are utilizing our treaty rights to bolster our economies and improve the lives of our peoples.
But in other respects we continue to be stymied by a host of federal rules and regulations, conflicting judicial precedents, extraordinary crime rates, state officials who continue to view our governments as temporary and not quite legitimate, and a larger public that holds contradictory views of our cultures, governments, and identities.
When our own Native governments make self-serving citizenship decisions that violate our own historic values and traditions, they insult all that we are, all we have inherited, and all we have to pass on. It is time for the leaders of our keystone organizations to step out of the shadows and clearly denounce such unethical and unjustifiable practices. Add your voices to the growing chorus of those opposed to the political termination of native citizens when that happens in violation of our histories of united kinship and when it is carried out without due process or equal protection of the law.
Your organizations have provided leadership and inspiration in many critical areas. Do not let our histories record that you passively stood by and looked the other way as our sovereignty rotted from the inside out—cheapened, weakened, and destroyed by our own actions.
David E. Wilkins (Lumbee) is a citizen of the Lumbee Nation and holds the McKnight Presidential Professorship in American Indian Studies at the University of Minnesota. He is the author of several books, includingHollow Justice: Indigenous Claims in the US(2013);The Navajo Political Experience, 4thed.(2013); andThe Hank Adams Reader(2011).
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