20 – Rethinking caste and violence in South Asia

October 3, 2025
8:30 am
H09
This panel will delve into the persistence of caste-based violence in postcolonial South Asian countries, moving beyond mere empirical data. It aims to explore why caste continues to influence Indian society and frequently manifests in violence. How is caste shape and reshape other South Asian states compared to India? Is violence an inherent aspect of casteism and the caste system? If so, how should this violence be understood within the context of caste? Invited papers will not only analyze caste but also investigate how violence seems to reinvent casteism in practice. Citizens at the margins of society are often at risk because of exploitation and power relations. The hegemonic triad of caste, class, and gender deserves further analysis and attention in the context of violence. While marriage and gender relations emphasize the social aspects of caste, they may also reflect a patriarchal power dimension crucial for analyzing the state in practice. How do these relations affect society and the state? Finally, how do perpetrators justify violence despite constitutional democratic principles and laws? A new trend in this context is the use of new media to expose violence to a broader audience, echoing the old practice of using violence to “teach a lesson.”

Convenors

Dr. Dag Erik Berg
Dr. L David Lal
Dr. Shailaja Menon

Presentations

Caste and Structural Violence: Contextualizing Sewer Deaths of Valmiki Community in Delhi
Thakur Mukesh - University of Delhi, Department of Political Science, Delhi University, Delhi, India
Infrastructures of caste and violence: fueling political transformations in India’s wind energy sector
Singh David - Department of Food and Resource Economics, University of Copenhagen, COPENHAGEN, Denmark
Caste and Infrastructural Violence:Experiences of Dispossession, Denial and Dehumanisation of Dalit Waste Workers in Patna
Raj Rahul - School of Geography and Planning, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, United Kingdom
Marked by Caste, Silenced by Power: The Case of Rajni
Lal L David - Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, Indian Institute of Information Technology Guwahati, Guwahati, India
Intersectionality of Caste Violence: From the Standpoint of Anti-Caste Activists
DIWAKAR JYOTI - DEPARTMENT OF POLITICAL SCIENCE, UNIVERSITY OF DELHI, NEW DELHI, India
Power and the persistence of caste-based domination
Berg Dag-Erik - Business Administration and Social Science, Molde University College, Molde, Norway
The Problem of Caste Violence and Death
MAHANAND JADUMANI - JINDAL GLOBAL LAW SCHOOL, O P JINDAL GLOBAL UNIVERSITY, SONIPAT, India