In the latest incident in the largest Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, a group of women confronted a man, who stood guard at a temple gate to prevent the scheduled caste women from entering the temple to worship the local deity.
In the incident, recorded on a mobile phone camera, one of the agitated Dalit women can be heard shunning the man for his conservative mentality while another strongly protested against the man who tried to stop them from entering the temple gate in the state's Bulandshahar district.
In the video, a woman can be heard saying in Hindi, “If you are not scared of anyone, why wouldn’t you let us enter the temple?”
The man reiterates that the land belongs to the upper caste Thakur community, it is their ancestral land, and they have prohibited *Dalits from entering the temple.
The agitated women continued to protest even after the threat, refusing to budge from the gates of the temple until they were allowed to enter it.
The video soon made its way to social media, prompting people to slam the discrimination by locals who identify as members of the upper castes.
Reportedly, a complaint has been filed at the local police station in this regard and police have claimed to have launched a preliminary investigation into the matter.
*Millions of Dalits, tribals, and members of other scheduled castes, who are lowly ranked in the Indian caste system, have faced discrimination in the past by those belonging to upper castes.
The incident took place despite the existence of stringent laws’ under the Indian Penal Code like the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989 to curb such incidents.