Seattle ended up being the first United States city to ban caste discrimination on Tuesday, after its regional council voted to include caste to the citys anti-discrimination laws.The relocation addresses an issue crucial to the locations South Asian diaspora, especially the Indian and Hindu communities.
India's caste system is among the worlds earliest types of rigid social stratification.
The fight against caste discrimination is deeply linked to the battle versus all types of oppression, Kshama Sawant, an Indian American Seattle City Council member, said.The caste system goes back thousands of years and allows many advantages to upper castes however represses lower castes.
The Dalit community is on the lowest rung of the Indian Hindu caste system and have been treated as untouchables.
Caste discrimination doesnt only occur in other countries.
It is faced by South Asian American and other immigrant working individuals in their offices, consisting of in the tech sector, in Seattle and in cities around the country, Sawant said when her office presented the proposition to ban caste-based discrimination in Seattle.Caste discrimination was banned in India over 70 years ago, yet predisposition continues, according to a number of studies in recent years, consisting of one that found individuals from lower castes were underrepresented in higher-paying jobs.Even though India has actually prohibited untouchability, Dalits still face widespread abuse across that country, where their efforts at upward social mobility have actually at times been strongly put down.Debate over the caste systems hierarchy is controversial in India and abroad, with the problem linked with religion.
Some individuals say discrimination is now unusual.
Indian government policies booking seats for lower-caste trainees at top Indian universities have helped many land tech jobs in the West in recent years.Activists opposing caste discrimination say it is no different from other types of discrimination like bigotry and for this reason should be disallowed.
United States discrimination laws prohibit origins discrimination but do not clearly prohibit casteism.Source: Reuters-Agencies