482 entries found
In January 2025, Ethical Trade Norway convened a seminar titled “Responsible Trade with India – What Must You Know?” to explore the complexities of engaging with India’s vast and diverse market. The event underscored the critical importance of understanding caste-based discrimination, particularly against Dalits and Adivasis, within global supply chains. The Dalit Solidarity Network Norway also played an active role in the Seminar.
This report explores caste-based discrimination and challenges that Scheduled Caste workers face in Karachi’s export-oriented textiles and garment industry. While previous research has examined informality and marginalisation in the sector, there have been no previous studies of factors like race and ethnicity, religion and caste, beyond gender.
On 14 February 2025, IDSN, Arisa and Homeworkers Worldwide hosted a side-session at the OECD Forum on Due Diligence in the Garment and Footwear Sector. The discussion addressed the exploitation of Dalit workers in South Asia’s garment and leather industries that form part of global supply chains. The panel featured voices from the frontlines of labour rights, each offering insights into caste discrimination, forced and bonded labour and caste and gender-based violence at work.
On 3 February 2025, Durga Sob, founder of the Feminist Dalit Organisation (FEDO) and a leading advocate for Dalit women’s rights, delivered a statement in connection with the 90th Session of the UN Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) Committee’s review of Nepal. Representing both FEDO and IDSN, Ms. Sob highlighted the entrenched discrimination and social exclusion faced by Dalit women and girls in Nepal.
Take-aways on caste and gender intersectionality from the report “Tripartite Marginalisation” in South Asia: In countries like Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, Dalits face overlapping discrimination due to factors such as caste, gender, sexual orientation, economic status, disability and religion. This multi-layered disadvantage severely restricts their access to basic rights. Hazardous Labour: Dalit women are disproportionately forced into dangerous and informal jobs, most notably manual scavenging. The vast majority of those engaged in this degrading work are Dalit women, who are then denied access to basic necessities like clean water, healthcare, and other goods and services. Violence with Impunity: Caste and gender-based violence are rampant, serving to reinforce oppressive social hierarchies. This violence often goes unpunished due to systemic discrimination within justice systems. Examples include trafficking and forced prostitution, sexual violence against Dalit women as a tool of caste oppression, and forced religious conversions or marriages. In Nepal, a significant number of human trafficking survivors are Dalit women, with Badi Dalit women being especially vulnerable due to historical prejudices. LGBTQ+ Dalit individuals also face high risks of physical and sexual violence, and Dalit children endure severe social exclusion and corporal punishment in schools. Dalit Women and mainstream feminist movements: Dalit feminist scholars have tirelessly brought to light the specific social, sexual and cultural contexts that shape Dalit women’s lives. They show how Dalit women’s bodies, identities and work have been historically controlled and exploited. The report notes that Dalit women are often marginalised even within feminist academic circles, underscoring that any feminist movement that ignores caste is fundamentally flawed and complicit in perpetuating caste hierarchies. The Special Rapporteur outlines essential elements to tackle discrimination: Understand the roots: It’s vital to conduct systemic, racial and historical analyses of oppression, including caste. The report warns against a superficial use of “intersectionality” without truly dissecting the power systems and privilege that fuel inequality. Without this, the concept risks losing its power to dismantle systemic discrimination. Listen to affected communities: The diverse experiences of those facing caste discrimination must be central to all efforts. Full and effective participation of caste-oppressed communities in all policy and decision-making spaces is non-negotiable. The report highlights a worrying trend: Dalit communities experience low representation in policymaking in India. Collect disaggregated data: Gathering data that is disaggregated by race, ethnicity, and caste, among other identities, is described as a critical tool. This “intersectional data” is powerful because it makes invisible communities and their struggles visible, challenges stereotypes and exposes systemic disparities. Demand justice and reparation: Laws must be expanded to include all forms of intersectional discrimination. Beyond this, the report champions comprehensive and structural reparatory justice approaches. These are crucial for acknowledging and fully addressing the harms of historical atrocities, especially those related to caste oppression. True justice, the report asserts, must be grounded in the lived experiences of those who have suffered systemic racism and intersectional discrimination.
2025 Intersectionality report by the UN Special Rapporteur on Racism makes it clear: caste and gender oppression and discrimination are not isolated issues but deeply interconnected forms of systemic violence. It highlights how understanding the concept of intersectionality is vital for unmasking the complex layers of discrimination and exclusion. The report also details how one-size-fits-all solutions simply don’t work, because the experiences of caste-oppressed communities are highly complex and varied. An intersectional lens helps to challenge harmful stereotypes and portrayals of these communities as homogenous. The report also highlights the need to challenge hate-speech online as well as offline.
A Joint Submission by Dalit CSOs Consortium to the United Nations - Universal Periodic Review 51st Session (Fourth Cycle) of the UPR Working Group of the Human Rights Council (HRC) Concerning Caste-based Discrimination and Violence against Dalits in Nepal Submitted by: Dalit CSOs Consortium for UPR Nepal (DCC-UN) This consortium comprises over 30 Dalit-led organizations dedicated to the empowerment and advancement of the Dalit community. Operating across various sectors and regions of the country, the member organizations bring a diverse range of experiences and expertise to their collective efforts. In collaboration with: International Dalit Solidarity Network (IDSN)
Sanitation work in Pakistan is disproportionately assigned to non-Muslims who belong to so-called “lower castes”, often without real choice in the matter. This report explores how communities in Pakistan that are marginalized due to their caste and religious identities experience compounded discrimination in Pakistan’s sanitation sector. Pakistani authorities must abide by international human rights law and standards and extend rights to sanitation workers without discrimination on the basis of class, caste and religion through specific legislative action to address caste-based discrimination, treating sewerage work as hazardous and ensuring effective implementation of labour laws to sanitation work. 29 July 2025 Index Number: ASA 33/0120/2025 Report by Amnesty International
This is a guest post written by Priyanka Samy from IDSN member organization National Federation of Dalit Women (NFDW) – July 2025 On March 3, 2025, the National Federation of Dalit Women (NFDW) and Women’s Voice convened, “Commemorating Beijing+30: Reflections and Forward-Looking Strategies – A National Assembly of Women from Marginalised Communities” in Bangalore, India. This historic convening brought together 250 feminist leaders from the Dalit, Adivasi, Bahujan, Muslim, LBTIQA+, persons with disabilities, and working-class communities from across 20 states in India. The aim of the meeting was to reflect on three decades of the Beijing Platform for Action (BPfA), assess progress, and co-create strategies for a just, inclusive and intersectional future.
IDSN input on intersectionality from a racial justice perspective to Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism This report has had input from Pakistan Dalit Solidarity Network (PDSN), All India Dalit Mahila Adhikar Manch (AIDMAM)- National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights (NCDHR), Bangladesh Dalit and Excluded Rights Movement (BDERM), Better World Shelter and Feminist Dalit Organisation. It is impossible to address intersectionality without a focus on gender and gender justice from a racial justice perspective. Therefore, this submission takes the intersectionality of caste and gender as its central premise.
Background: In April 2022, Indian women- and Dalit-worker led union TTCU signed a historic agreement with clothing and textile manufacturer Eastman Exports to end gender-based violence and harassment at Eastman factories in Dindigul, in the southern state of Tamil Nadu, India. TTCU, GLJ-ILRF, and AFWA also signed a legally binding agreement, subject to arbitration, with multinational fashion company H&M, which has an ongoing business relationship with Eastman Exports. This agreement requires H&M to support and enforce the TTCU-Eastman Exports agreement. Under the terms of the agreement, if Eastman Exports violates its commitments, H&M is obligated to impose business consequences on Eastman Exports until Eastman comes into compliance.
factsheet on Caste-based Gender Violence against Dalit Women and Girls in India. The factsheet is based on data analysis of the National Crime Records Bureau of India. The analysis concludes that the rise in atrocities against Dalit women and minor girls indicates that the existing laws are not effectively or appropriately enforced.The data that is caste disaggregated reflects this grim reality, while there is still much crime data that remains to be disaggregated - masking even bigger issues. Additionally low conviction, lesser punishment and higher disposal of cases related to Dalit women and girls, are found to be important factors to consider while working for prevention of violence against Dalit women and girls. The report also highlights several concrete cases of violations and the miscarriage of justice.
Submitting Organisations - The joint shadow report was submitted by the Feminist Dalit Organisation and the International Dalit Solidarity Network.
This is a summary brief - The full report submitted for the UN CEDAW 2025 review can be downloaded here https://tinyurl.com/IDSN-FEDO-CEDAW2025 Submitting Organisations - The joint shadow report was submitted by the Feminist Dalit Organisation and the International Dalit Solidarity Network. The FEDO is a Dalit women-led Nepalese NGO. FEDO works towards a discrimination-free society where dignity, human-rights, equal participation and benefits from development are afforded to Dalit women. The IDSN is a global membership network advocating and raising awareness for Dalit human rights.
Global Forum of Communities Discriminated on Work and Descent (GFoD) Submission to Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls to the UN General Assembly on violence against women andgirls in sport - includes information on Dalit women and girls in Nepal and India
Joint submission by IDSN and Nepal NGOs to the UN Committee on Elimination of Discrimination Against Woman (CEDAW) - 2024 review of Nepal. Highlight the need for action on caste and gender justice in Nepal.
his report documents the experience of Dalits, especially Dalit women, with systemic caste-based discrimination in Nepal, including the practice of untouchability, and the challenges they face in accessing justice. The report uses a human rights and intersectional lens, recognizing that systemic discrimination and inequality are the cause and consequence of several human rights violations, and that racism is a system of unequal power relations, which lead to human rights violations and barriers in accessing rights.
IDSN welcomes the adoption of the European Parliament’s report on human rights and democracy in the world and the European Union’s policy on the matter 2023, calling for concrete action to support the work to end caste discrimination. The report highlights caste-related obstacles to accessing justice, employment opportunities and the persistence of segregation and poverty. It underscores how caste-related barriers severely limit the exercise of basic human rights and human development. The European Parliament expresses serious concern over these issues, calling for an EU policy specifically designed to combat caste-based discrimination.
In a significant development at the 55th session of the Human Rights Council in March 2024, Bangladesh’s review under the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) highlighted critical recommendations focused on eliminating caste-based discrimination, with specific references to the plight of the Dalit community. These recommendations were crucially also accepted by the state.
