On equality

• In a democratic country, like India, all adults irrespective of what religion they belong to, how much education they have had, what caste they are, or whether they are rich or poor are allowed to vote
• Universal adult franchise


  An essential aspect of all democracies where every adult citizen has the right to vote
• The idea of universal adult franchise is based on the idea of equality because it states that every citizen in a country, irrespective of their wealth and the communities they belong to, has one vote
• Kanta is excited to vote and happy that she is equal to all of the other because each of them has one vote
• Kanta becomes less certain about what this equality really means
• Kanta lives in a slum, has a drain behind her house, her daughter is sick but she cannot take the day off from work because she needs to borrow money from her employers to take her child to the doctor, her job as a domestic help tires her out, and she ends her day by again standing in a long line in front of the government hospital
• Apart from being poor, people in India experience inequality in different ways
• One of the more common forms of inequality in India is the caste system
• Even in urban India, the issue of caste continues to be important in the minds of highly educated people
• Omprakash Valmiki: 'I had to sit away from the others in the class, and that too on the floor. The mat ran out before reaching the spot I sat on. Sometimes I would have to sit way behind everybody, right near the door...sometimes they would beat me without any reason.'
• Omprakash Valmiki, a Dalit child, was made to sweep the school and the playground by the headmaster
• Mr and Mrs Ansari, a Muslim couple, were denied renting an apartment in the city because of their religious identity
• The property dealer suggested that the Ansaris change their names to Mr and Mrs Kumar to be able to rent an apartment
• It took the Ansaris a whole month of looking at apartments before they found a landlady who was willing to give them a place on rent
• Midday meal scheme

  1. Introduced in all government elementary schools

  2. Provide children with cooked lunch
• Tamil Nadu was the first state in India to introduce this scheme
• In 2001, the Supreme Court asked all state governments to begin this programme in their schools within six months
• Positive effects of the midday meal scheme


  • More poor children have begun enrolling and regularly attending school
  • Teachers reported that earlier children would often go home for lunch and then not return to school but now with the midday meal being provided in school, their attendance has improved
  • Mothers no longer need to interrupt their work to feed their children at home during the day
  • Helps reduce caste prejudices as both lower and upper caste children in the school eat this meal together
  • Dalit women have been employed to cook the meal
  • Helps reduce the hunger of poor students who often come to school and cannot concentrate because their stomachs are empty
• While government programmes play an important role in increasing equality of opportunity, there is much that still needs to be done
• While the midday meal programme has helped increase the enrolment and attendance of poor children in school, there continues to be big differences in our country between schools that the rich attend and those that the poor attend
• Even today there are several schools in the country in which Dalit children are discriminated against and treated unequally
• These children are forced into unequal situations in which their dignity is not protected
• Even though persons are aware that discrimination is against the law, they continue to treat people unequally on the basis of their caste, religion, disability, economic status and because they are women
• It is only when people begin to believe that no one is inferior, and that every person deserves to be treated with dignity, that present attitudes can change
• Establishing equality in a democratic society is a continuous struggle and one in which individuals as well as various communities in India contribute to
• In many democratic countries around the world, the issue of equality continues to be the key issue around which communities struggle
• In the United States of America, the African-Americans whose ancestors were the slaves who were brought over from Africa, continue to describe their lives today as largely unequal
• Prior to the late 1950s, African-Americans were treated extremely unequally in the United States and denied equality through law
• When travelling by bus, African-Americans either had to sit at the back of the bus or get up from their seat whenever a white person wished to sit
• Rosa Parks

  An African-American woman who refused to give up her seat on a bus to a white man on 1 December 1955, starting a huge agitation against the unequal ways in which African-Americans were treated
• The Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibited discrimination on the basis of race, religion or national origin
• The Civil Rights Act of 1964 stated that all schools would be open to African-American children and that they would no longer have to attend separate schools specially set up for them
• Despite the Civil Rights Act of 1964, a majority of African-Americans continue to be among the poorest in the country
• Most African-American children can only afford to attend government schools, that have fewer facilities and poorly qualified teachers as compared to white students who either go to private schools or live in areas where the government schools are as highly rated as private schools
• Access to


  • shops
  • public resouranes
  • hotels
  • places of public entertainment
• As you read these chapters, think about whether the equality of all persons and their being able to maintain their dignity is upheld
• Article 15 of the Indian Constitution


  Prohibition of discrimination on grounds of religion race, caste, sex or place of birth
• Article 15(1)


  The State shall not discriminate against any citizen on grounds only of religion, race, caste, sex, place of birth or any of them
• Article 15(2)


  No citizen shall on grounds only of religion, race, caste, sex, place of birth or any of them be subject to any disability, liability, restriction or condition with regard to:

  (a) access to shops, public restaurants, hotels and places of public entertainment

  (b) the use of wells, tanks, bathing ghats, roads and places of public resort maintained wholly or partly out of State funds or dedicated to the use of the general public
• Central to this is the struggle for the recognition of all persons as equal and for their dignity to be maintained