This rich and extraordinary volume brings together contributions from scholars across the humanities and social sciences to provide an incisive analysis of the identity of the Dalits in history, literature and society. The essays organised in four thematic clusters, raise crucial questions: Who is a Dalit? Are Dalits a social or sociological category and what is their relationship with the mainstream? How are women represented among the Dalits? Can a Muslim be a Dalit? Can the Dalits form a unitary, socio-political category?Concerned and cognizant of the collective trauma and memories of centuries of unspeakable oppression, the essays in this volume focus on Dalit assertion and agency in postcolonial India, their challenge of the bigotry and prejudice of the dominant castes and their quest to break free from poverty and social exclusion. They also examine the dynamics of a pervasive caste system that is intrinsically hostile to the growth of a collective consciousness among the backward classes

Lucid and authoritative, the volume is an important contribution to the growing discipline of caste studies.

Book Reviews
http://www.hindu.com/br/2011/04/05/stories/2011040551421700.htm

CONTENTS
List of Tables and Figures

Introduction

Section A: Dalits and Society

1. Resolving Dalit Identity: Vankars, Chamars, Valmikis
JyotsnaMacwan and SugunaRamanathan

2. At the Intersection of Caste, Class and Patriarchy:
Exploring Dalit Women's Oppression
Padma Velaskar

3. Social Democracy in Indian Villages:
The Experience of Dalits in Southern Tamil Nadu
A. Ramaiah

4. The Category 'Rural' Revisited:
A Dalit Perspective from a Village in Maharashtra
RitambharaHebbar

5. The Story of a Dalit Family from a Sleepy
North Bihar Village
Ashok Singh

6. Caste System in India: Dr Ambedkar's Perspective
P. G. Jogdand

7. Laws and Homestead Land for Rural Landless
Labourers and Marginalised Communities
inBihar:A Micro-perspective
Sanjay Kumar

Section B: Dalits and Literature

8. Dalit Literature: A Perspective from Below
Raj Kumar

9. Transcending Orbits of Dalit Women's
Minor Literature
Smita Patil

10. Premchand and Dalit Literature: Representation
ofDalits in the Literature of Premchand
Shashi Bhushan Upadhyay

Section C: Dalits in History

11. Rajwars in Revolt, 1857–58: Saga of
Heroism and Sacrifices of Little-known People
A. K. Biswas

12. Caste and the Writing of History
Prathama Banerjee

Section D: Castes among Indian Minorities

13. Can there be a Category called Dalit Muslims?
Imtiaz Ahmad

14. Islam and Caste Inequalities among Indian Muslims
Yoginder Sikand

15. Social Exclusion, Resistance and Deras:
Exploring the Myth of Casteless Sikh
Society in Punjab
Ronki Ram
Glossary
Index

Tables
11.1 Literacy among the Rajwars in 1991
11.2 Occupational pattern of the Rajwars in 1991

Figures
7.1 Households having ownership rights over homestead
7.2 Households by period of residing on their homestead
7.3 Reasons for not having legal entitlement to homestead land

The Author(s)/ Editor(s)
Imtiaz Ahmad retired as Professor of Political Sociology at Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.
Shashi Bhushan Upadhyay is currently Reader of History at the Indira Gandhi National Open University, New Delhi.