— ✍️ Adala Anvith Reddy & Dr. Karamala Areesh Kumar

Whenever the issue of caste enters global discourse, it is always dismissed as either region-specific or as having limited ramifications in the international arena. However, the lived reality of millions around the world who experience it—including discrimination, violence, and economic marginalisation due to this stratificational system—has been nothing short of discriminatory. It is important to note that caste today does not confine itself to the borders of India and has permeated countries which have a large Indian immigrant population or a population of Indian descent. As S.V. Ketkar, in his book History of Caste in India, pointed out, “If Hindus migrate to other regions on earth, Indian caste will become a world problem.” Over the past decades, anti-caste organisations, NGOs, and human rights activists have been pushing for the inclusion of caste in the major human rights framework and argue that caste discrimination is as much a form of discrimination as race, gender, and sex discrimination.

The first notable event that brought caste discrimination within the purview of international institutions was the World Conference against Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia, and Related Intolerance (WCAR), also known as the Durban Conference, held in 2001. It served as a bedrock for the global anti-caste movement. Led by groups such as The National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights (NCDHR) and the International Dalit Solidarity Network (IDSN), campaigners pushed for the inclusion of caste-based discrimination in the international agenda. Their core argument was that, just as race-based oppression and discrimination happen based on descent or ancestry, "untouchability" has the same characteristics, and they demanded that this same characterisation should be applied to caste discrimination. This proposal, however, faced backlash from the Indian government, which claimed that caste and race are fundamentally different social constructs, even though they share the same underlying characteristics of discrimination based on descent or ancestry. The Indian government claimed that provisions regarding caste discrimination were already addressed in the constitution, which has led to affirmative action policies and welfare policies aimed at the upliftment of marginalised communities. In the end, even though the Durban Conference did not explicitly address caste, it was a success, launching the idea of caste discrimination onto the global stage and leading international organisations to recognise it as a genuine human rights issue rather than another cultural abnormality.

Even though the Durban Conference was a success, it still did not formally recognise caste as an entity deserving of special status in the international law framework. To achieve this, activists lobbied for caste to fall under the purview of the ICERD (International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination). This United Nations convention aims to eliminate racial discrimination worldwide. Although the convention doesn’t explicitly mention caste in its charter, under the definition in Article 1 of ICERD, it mentions that the term "racial discrimination" shall mean any distinction, exclusion, restriction, or preference based on race, colour, descent, or national or ethnic origin which has the purpose or effect of nullifying or impairing the recognition, enjoyment, or exercise, on an equal footing, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural, or any other field of public life. The argument that many scholars, such as Dr Annapurna Waughray, gave was that caste discrimination falls within the purview of this system, as both racism and caste discrimination have the same underlying factor of discrimination, i.e., descent. Since ICERD clearly describes descent as one of its key factors when it comes to defining racism and discrimination, caste can also be considered under this convention. Following the Durban Conference in 2002, ICERD issued a groundbreaking judgment under General Recommendation No. 29, which defines descent-based discrimination as “discrimination based on 'descent' includes discrimination against members of communities based on forms of social stratification such as caste and analogous systems of inherited status.”

When we look at caste beyond India's borders, it becomes clear that as the South Asian diaspora grows and becomes an integral part of countries such as the UK and the US, for example, so too do the cultural practices of these migrants, including caste. This, in turn, forces these countries to adopt anti-caste legislation within their states to ensure that this does not become a basis for discrimination. The UK, for instance, has become one of the fiercest battlegrounds for anti-caste legislation owing to its large population of South Asian origin and diaspora. Caste discrimination is not expressly prohibited under UK equality legislation, although Section 9 of the Equality Act 2010, as amended, requires the Government to introduce secondary legislation to make caste an aspect of race, thereby making caste discrimination a form of race discrimination. However, this did not yield much of a result, owing to the fact that after public consultation in 2018, the government declined to integrate this particular aspect into the Equality Act of 2010 by stating that “The inability to define ‘caste’ within the legislation, even if an effective and suitable definition could be agreed on, presented a significant complication to introducing a concept into law that would potentially be open to a variety of interpretations. Interpreting caste either too narrowly or too broadly could give rise to either the legislation failing to cover some of those it was intended to protect or risk importing concepts into law that it was not designed to cover.” The UK government also expanded on this by giving the example of Tirkey v Chandhok, in which the UK tribunal ruled that caste discrimination also falls under the purview of discrimination against “ethnic origins” within the Equality Act and stated that caste discrimination need not have a special emphasis.

In the US, however, caste activists have achieved historical milestones. In Feb 2023, Seattle became the first city to enforce a ban on caste discrimination. This movement was spearheaded by councilwoman Kshama Sawant, who stated that caste is a lived reality for thousands of people in the state and across the broader country. For example, in 2020, California’s Department of Fair Employment and Housing filed a lawsuit against Cisco Systems because two upper-caste Indian American employees discriminated against a Dalit employee. After this came to light, Sawant argued that casteism was an existing force in America and needed legislation to counter it or bring it within the purview of the law. As a result of this movement, the city council added “caste” as an explicit protected class under its anti-discriminatory code and framework. In 2023, the California legislature passed Senate Bill 403, which, if enacted, would have recognised caste discrimination within the legal system. However, Gavin Newsom vetoed the bill, stating that there were already sufficient safeguards within the existing legal framework to prevent caste-based discrimination and that separate legislation was not needed.

The anti-caste movement, led by Equality Labs, Ambedkar International Centre, Dalit Solidarity Forum, Dalit Solidarity Network, Caste Watch UK, and Anti-Caste Discrimination Alliance, played a very significant role in bringing caste into global platform discussions. Although there have been some strides in recognising caste discrimination in the legal framework within international institutions and governments—most specifically the ICERD—these kinds of laws cannot address caste, considering that caste is a social construct which is deeply rooted in tradition and every walk of life. Without separate laws from the state to the global level, caste is ignored within the world's legal systems.

- Adala Anvith Reddy is an undergraduate student and Dr. Karamala Areesh Kumar is the Head, Department of International Relations, Peace and Public Policy (IRP and PP), St Joseph’s University, Bengaluru.