The United Kingdom is home to over three million South Asians and many believe that they carry with them the baggage of caste, when they move from the sub-continent.
To prevent caste based discrimination in UK, the British Parliament passed the Equality Act 2010. The enacted legislation is yet to be implemented. The United Nations Committee for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) appealed the British Government to implement the Equality Act 2010 without further delay when there was a move on the part of the Government headed by Theresa May to hold a full public consultation on the law.
The Government must have implemented the Act, once it is enacted and further holding of consultation is viewed as the result of pressure exerted by the masses who wish to uphold their caste identity. But the Anti- Caste Discrimination Alliance (ACDA), the groups and organization working to eliminate caste discrimination, is on the continuous efforts to implement the law. They say the fight is about securing equality and ending the discrimination.
The charge of the ACDA is “Caste discrimination is no different to discrimination on grounds of disability, gender, colour, age or sexuality in the UK. Why is the government seeking the views of potential perpetrators in respect of caste discrimination law in the UK? By announcing such a consultation, Prime Minister Theresa May has shown that she and her government are swerved by factions that militate against caste discrimination law on religious or whatever grounds.”
The fight still endures, not to enact legislation, but to implement the already enacted law without further delay and without yielding to the pressures from the potential perpetrators who uphold their religious value.
Source: The Wire
As per Vedic prescription the religious minded potential perpetrators should not have left the subcontinent to settle at the UK. Once they cross the oceanic waterstead, their religious identity (Hindu identity) is lost. Once religious identity is lost, how can the caste identity endure? Such is the power of caste identity over and above the religious identity.
