Articles by: Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

Anti-Caste Laws in America: Thwarting Aryan Hatred Against Jesus As Dalit?

Anti-Caste Laws in America: Thwarting Aryan Hatred Against Jesus As Dalit?

Lot of discussion and writing is happening in India about anti-caste laws and rules getting framed in America, the dream land of Dwijas of India. Several Hindutva intellectuals are telling stories about their love for Dalits without telling anything about how their forefathers created this barbaric system, which is now getting globalized and how they want to participate in abolishing[Read More…]

by 27/02/2023 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
Why did Tulsidas ask his God Rama to punish Shudras and women not Mughal rulers?

Why did Tulsidas ask his God Rama to punish Shudras and women not Mughal rulers?

The anti-Shudra, Dalit and women language of Tulsidas in his Ramcharitamanas  engendered a major controversy in North India. Its impact could also be seen in the South, which already had a strong Shudra mobilization history. He equated them with animals and drums and wanted to keep punishing them forever. The new consciousness of the Shudras, Dalits and women is not going to accept[Read More…]

by 06/02/2023 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
The Anti-Caste Pen Force

The Anti-Caste Pen Force

One who practices caste is a devil That devil has to be driven out of India India must be made a country of equality. The tiller must sow the letters of English Our soil must become a global knowledge power Caste has cultivated mindlessness The anti-caste pen will have to change India. Nationalism is not casteism Caste and race were[Read More…]

by 18/11/2022 Comments are Disabled Arts/Literature
English India In The Making

English India In The Making

October 5th is International Teachers Day. It is also Indian English Day. English language education has a history of 205 years in India. Incidentally October 5th is also my 70th birthday. My thirty years campaign for English medium education for poor children in the Government schools has come to a meaningful stage. William Carey and Raja Ramohan Roy started the[Read More…]

by 28/09/2022 Comments are Disabled India
Condemn the brutal attack on Salman Rushdie

Condemn the brutal attack on Salman Rushdie

I am deeply shocked to know about such a brutal attack on the globally renowned writer Salman Rushdie in New York by forces that have been planning to kill him for a long time. As a writer and columnist myself I cannot sit silent without condemning such a brutal attack on fellow writers. He was an Indian born writer with[Read More…]

by 13/08/2022 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
Human as Christian-2

Human as Christian-2

 How labour and God shaped the world As I went late to school in life, perhaps after eight years I was born, in mid 1960 (my school record birth day is 5 October, 1952),  for quite some time I was with cattle and agrarian operations in my early juvenile days even after going to school in my village. Throughout the[Read More…]

by 28/06/2022 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
Is The Congress On Suicide Course?

Is The Congress On Suicide Course?

The Congress Party’s ideological steps remind us of a famous saying of Lenin “ One Step Forward, Two Steps Backward’ not in a tactical sense of retreating and advancing with a progressive strategy in a given unfavourable political environment, but retreating in a more consistent manner with blindfolded vision. The present crisis is much bigger for the party than that[Read More…]

by 23/06/2022 Comments are Disabled India
Human As Christian

Human As Christian

My name is Ilaiah–O, you are from a wretched caste I added Shepherd to it–O, you have become a Christian I read and write–O, you have violated the Dharma I read and write in English–Then, you want to break India I travel abroad– O, Christians fund your travel I believe in one God–Then, you are in touch with Jesus My[Read More…]

by 18/06/2022 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
St. Devasahayam’s Caste, Crucifixion And His Resurrection As A Global Shudra Saint

St. Devasahayam’s Caste, Crucifixion And His Resurrection As A Global Shudra Saint

The canonization of the first ever layman of India,  Devasahayam, or  Lazarus (1712–1752) as saint, on the lines of Mother Theresa or on the lines of St.Peter, by the Vatican on 15 May, 2022 is historic in many strange ways. The human history of religions does not find a man of his kind of torturous life from birth, growth and[Read More…]

by 09/06/2022 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
An Open Letter To Muslims And Christians Of India

An Open Letter To Muslims And Christians Of India

As some of you are aware, I am a Shudra intellectual and activist, working and writing to change the unequal conditions of the Dalits, Adivasis and Shudras (including the Other Backward Classes) in the Indian Brahminic Hindutva rule. My books Why I am Not a Hindu, Post-Hindu India and Buffalo Nationalism have been attacked by the Brahminic Hindutva forces and also dragged to[Read More…]

by 10/05/2022 1 comment India
The Christian Schools And Brahmin Women

The Christian Schools And Brahmin Women

In 1971 , when I left school, I was sure that I was opting out of the traditional Brahmin world–it was too burdensome for a woman to carry that cross. Gita Ramaswamy in her just released Memoirs Land, Guns, Caste, Woman (2022) Gita Ramaswamy was born in a Brahmin family, never remained one in her later life. She is an[Read More…]

by 01/05/2022 1 comment Book Review
The Russian Orthodox Church And The World Crisis

The Russian Orthodox Church And The World Crisis

Extreme religious or anti-religious engagement of the ruling political forces in modern times would have serious negative consequences for the society as whole and the state apparatus. The Russian experience shows this very clearly. The communist phase of Russia was completely anti-religion. Now Putin’s Russia is deeply associated with the Orthodox Church that suffered a lot during the communist regime. Vladimir[Read More…]

by 10/03/2022 Comments are Disabled World
Telengana Armed Struggle Hero Bandru Narsimhulu Dies At 106

Telengana Armed Struggle Hero Bandru Narsimhulu Dies At 106

On 22 January, 2022 a 106 years old Bandru Narsimhulu died in Hyderabad with a heart attack. Otherwise he was still active. When he was much active he entered into an agreement with Mahabub Nagar district Government hospital, to give his body for research use. On the very day of his death after his friends, political supporters and relatives saw[Read More…]

by 29/01/2022 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
The Shudra/OBC Delhi Declaration

The Shudra/OBC Delhi Declaration

On 21 December, 2021 a majorNational Shudra/OBC conclave took place in Delhi Talkatora stadium with hundreds of Shudra/OBC activists, intellectuals and political leaders across the parties, different universities and civil societal organizations gathered. They put out the first ever Shudra/OBC declaration, which has a historical significance for the nation . After the historic farmers struggle, which essentially was a Shudra/OBC[Read More…]

by 26/12/2021 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
The Shudras in Hindtva – Living Without a Soul

The Shudras in Hindtva – Living Without a Soul

Introduction: The Hindutva school has been in power since 2014. It wants to rule India forever. Actually it was never out of power in another sense of the concept, power. As an organization–the Rastriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS)– that came into existence in 1925 was controlling many nerve centers of India’s socio-spiritual structures of the Hindu system. Ideological browbeating of Muslims[Read More…]

by 21/11/2021 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
Clash of Cultures in India

Clash of Cultures in India

With the BJP coming to power in 2014 and also in 2019 for the second time the Clash of Cultures in India is increasing day by day. After it came to power under the leadership of Narendra Modi, who is known for his political upbringing in the Rastriya Swayamsevak Sangh, which historically is known for upholding the anti-agrarian and artisanal productive[Read More…]

by 08/10/2021 1 comment India
What English Has Done To India And The World?

What English Has Done To India And The World?

By October 5, 2021 English language life in India is 204 years. For the last few years the celebration of Indian English Day on that day is catching up. Ever since the first English medium school started in the then Calcutta in 1817 on October 5, India never allowed that language to die. It has been growing and growing not[Read More…]

by 24/09/2021 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
Caste Census And Secular Intellectuals

Caste Census And Secular Intellectuals

The debate on caste, not just OBC, census is becoming a serious political issue in the country. But the secular, liberal and left intellectuals–economists, sociologists, political scientists– are behaving as if they are a neutral force on this issue. Would they have behaved in the same way if the Government were to say that it would not do religion census as well? I am sure they would not. They would have filled the[Read More…]

by 16/09/2021 Comments are Disabled India
India Will Remember Gail Omvedt For Ever

India Will Remember Gail Omvedt For Ever

Dr.Gail Omvedt, (81) one of the greatest scholars on caste studies passed away on 24 August 2021 evening in her village Kesegaon Maharashtra. She has pioneered caste studies having come as a student from America and settled down in India in the 1970s. She later married Bharat Patankar a Marxists scholar, activist; both of them lived in his village all[Read More…]

by 25/08/2021 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
The Shudra Kings And Brahmins: A mirror image of history

The Shudra Kings And Brahmins: A mirror image of history

But for the accidental reading of Shahu Maharaj’s letter to the retired Governor of Bombay presidency, Lord Sydenham, written in 1918, I would not have thought of writing this essay. In my life time experience of writing about the Brahmin-Bania power in contemporary times at the expense of life threats and cases in various levels of courts the Dwija pundits[Read More…]

by 24/08/2021 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
Modi, Mohan Bhagwat And The Secular Morality

Modi, Mohan Bhagwat And The Secular Morality

After Mohan Bhagwat, the Sarsanchalak of the Rastriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), addressed the ‘positivity unlimited’ theme about Covid calamity of India on 15 May, 2021, even secular writers in the national media started a chorus of Modi devil, Mohan Bhagwat angel song. ‘Bhagat snubbed modi’, ‘Bhagat advised him to accept collective responsibility’, ‘The RSS is for course correction’ and so[Read More…]

by 19/07/2021 Comments are Disabled India
The Hindutva Cow Urine Cultural Nationalism And The Corona Crisis

The Hindutva Cow Urine Cultural Nationalism And The Corona Crisis

Ever Since the Rastriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) combine came to power in 2014 the deepest crisis it is facing is the Covid-19 dance of death. As of the end of April 2021 India has become the most Covid infected nation in the world and the prediction is that India will suffer the biggest human[Read More…]

by 05/05/2021 1 comment India
Shudras And The Central Universities

Shudras And The Central Universities

  A well-known Dalit scholar Gopal Guru, presently editor of the Economic and Political Weekly, once wrote that “Indian Social Science represents a pernicious divide between theoretical Brahmins and empirical Shudras’ (2002). But Shudras did not get much attention in his, otherwise useful article. He immediately shifted his argument to the question of Dalits. Nowhere he elaborated his understanding of the[Read More…]

by 27/03/2021 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
How ‘Shudra’ And OBC Categories Differ?

How ‘Shudra’ And OBC Categories Differ?

When we were finalizing the title of my latest book The Shudras–Vision for a New Path edited along with Karthik Raja Karuppusamy for Penguin, there was a serious view that the concept “Shudra” must be avoided as it is not acceptable now. The secular intellectuals in post- colonial India completely avoided caste/varna categories in teaching and writing as if they never existed[Read More…]

by 12/03/2021 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
Disha Ravi Is Nation’s Heroine

Disha Ravi Is Nation’s Heroine

The nation must be thankful to Prime Minister Narender Modi and Amit Shah, more so to the RSS/BJP for giving this nation young leaders of future. Disha Ravi is definitely the hope and future of India. Leaders emerge only when the nation is in a crisis. Particularly very young leaders emerge when it is charged with emotion for freedom or[Read More…]

by 25/02/2021 Comments are Disabled India
The Rightist Regimes, Monopoly Houses And State

The Rightist Regimes, Monopoly Houses And State

In a globalized world market the monopoly houses are growing in a manner that they could control the democratic state apparatus in the countries of their headquarters like never before. When the right wing parties come to power with the full support of monopoly houses there is a contract between monopoly houses and the party that their market reach must[Read More…]

by 11/02/2021 Comments are Disabled India
Farmers Are Tillers, Not Killers

Farmers Are Tillers, Not Killers

Kangana Ranaut again and again is attacking the Indian farmers as terrorists. She has done that in response to the world famous pop singer Rihanna and famous environmentalist girl Greta’s support to farmers movement. Sachin Tendulkar and other pro-BJP forces also joined the chorus. Most of these forces are pro-monopoly houses and hardly have any engagement with the agrarian production.[Read More…]

by 06/02/2021 Comments are Disabled India
How Aakar Patel Under-Read The Character Of Hindu Rashtra? A Review Article

How Aakar Patel Under-Read The Character Of Hindu Rashtra? A Review Article

  Aakar Patel starts his timely and well-researched book Our Hindu Rashtra: What It Is. How We Got Here with a sentence “Majoritarianism is primitive and easy to do”. He surmises that establishment of Hindu Rashtra, which has only one meaning, that a Kshatriya king should rule the Hindu Rashtra under the supervision of a Brahmin head priest. Such a Hindu[Read More…]

by 22/01/2021 Comments are Disabled Book Review
 Women protesting against the Farm Bills (Image for representative purpose)

Does RSS Have A Positive Agrarian Policy?

In the context of a massive farmer agitation to protect the agrarian productive mass self-respect and future of their age old occupation, it is important to see whether the ruling Rastriya Swayamsevak Sangh ideology has any scope for developing agriculture as against its pro-business ideology. If one looks at the policy documents of the RSS right from 1925 it’s Cultural[Read More…]

by 13/12/2020 Comments are Disabled India
The Shudra Civilization

The Shudra Civilization

India is a nation of second largest population in the world. China is the first largest populated nation with a land size bigger than India. India’s population according to 2011 census was 1210.2 million and China’s population was 1347.3 million. India’s land size is 3.287 million KMs, whereas China’s land size is 9.597 million KMs. China’s land size is three[Read More…]

Caste In Heaven: Can Shudras And Dalits Find Moksha In Brahminism?

Caste In Heaven: Can Shudras And Dalits Find Moksha In Brahminism?

I kept watching the funerals of people killed by the brutal coronavirus in the global pandemic of Covid-19 on TV channels and read about them in newspapers. Those dead bodies who are described as Hindu are being quickly burnt without anybody around. The usual presence of the Brahmin priest to recite slokas are nowhere to be seen. Only the rich[Read More…]

Why The Farmers Need English Education? Indian English Day Diary

Why The Farmers Need English Education? Indian English Day Diary

Every  October 5 is being celebrated as Indian English day by several equal medium education lovers in India. This is 203rd   year of the birth of English medium school education in India. The first English medium school in Calcutta was started by William Carey a British missionary, who came from a cobbler family background. He came to India in 1793[Read More…]

by 03/10/2020 Comments are Disabled India
Who Wrote Kulanirmulana: Voka Marxist Dhukpadham  (Annihilation of Caste: A Marxist Approach)

Who Wrote Kulanirmulana: Voka Marxist Dhukpadham  (Annihilation of Caste: A Marxist Approach)

From Devulapally Venkateswara Rao group one Suryaprakash and Krishna have been writing very unreadable document type of writeups against me. They have been trying to spread lies as information, rubbish as Marxist knowledge. One major unverified lie that they are spreading is that I did not write the first booklet on caste and Marxism in the history of Indian communist[Read More…]

by 07/09/2020 1 comment India
Can Brahmins Bring Revolution: An Assessment Through The Prism Of Tarimela Nagi Reddy

Can Brahmins Bring Revolution: An Assessment Through The Prism Of Tarimela Nagi Reddy

What is known as Devulapally Venkateswar Rao (DVR) defenders team, attacked my recent article on Usaa Barber. One of their objects was to assert that DVR, a vegetarian conservative Brahmin, who pretended to be a revolutionary is intellectually superior to the Shudra communist intellectual Tarimela Nagi (TN) Reddy. I take this attack as the appropriate occasion to compare and contrast[Read More…]

by 18/08/2020 Comments are Disabled India
When The PM’s Rama Is Different From That Of RSS/BJP

When The PM’s Rama Is Different From That Of RSS/BJP

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, not just in his personal capacity, but in his capacity as the Prime Minister of 130 crore Indians quite unexpectedly re-defined Rama totally in a different way than how the RSS/BJP have shown him to us for the last thirty years since 1989. He did that at Ayodhya and at the Ramajanma Bhoomi temple Bhoomi poojan[Read More…]

by 16/08/2020 Comments are Disabled India
Usaa, The Greatest Revolutionary Barber After Upali, Died of COVID-19

Usaa, The Greatest Revolutionary Barber After Upali, Died of COVID-19

Usaa Barber (Uppumavuluri Sambashivarao) (1951-2020)- a well-known social reformer, anti-caste ideologue and anti-brahminism fighter succumbed to COVID-19 on 25th July 2020. He died because of the Indian medical system that could not reach to a stage where it could meet the challenge posed by the new coronavirus. After Savitribai Phule and her son Dr.Yashwantharao died of Bubonic Plague in 1898,[Read More…]

by 04/08/2020 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
Macaulay Putras And The New Education Policy: Shudras/Dalits/Adivasis Must Be Vigilant

Macaulay Putras And The New Education Policy: Shudras/Dalits/Adivasis Must Be Vigilant

The BJP Education Policy (BEP)2020 has been formalised with a Cabinet approval on July 30, 2020. It is drafted by Krishnaswamy Kasturirangan (79) the BJP’s Education Committee Chairman. He was the chairman of the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO). He is an expert on sophisticated war weapon production centre, including nuclear weapons, but not of economic and social development of[Read More…]

by 01/08/2020 1 comment India
Agriculturalism And Hindutva

Agriculturalism And Hindutva

In China there was a philosophical school called Agriculturism between 770 BCE and 221 BCE. The main philosopher, who represented this school with a sophisticated exposition of that philosophy, was Xu Xing (372-289 BCE). His main philosophy was that people’s propensity is based on farming than to any other thing. By the third and the fourth century BCE the Chinese[Read More…]

by 24/07/2020 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
File photo of Indian Army and China's People's Liberation Army soldiers in September 2019 | Photo: ANI

India Needs High Jump, Not Yoga To Win War With China

War between India and China is on the cards. Though there is a retreat on both sides for the time being there is every possibility that war would break out any time in future.   Unlike a war between India and Pakistan or with any other neighbouring country war with China will have to be fought on two fronts. One, the[Read More…]

by 13/07/2020 Comments are Disabled India
Early India, Goats And Brahmins

Early India, Goats And Brahmins

I met Tony Joseph, the author of Early Indians – the History of Our Ancestors and Where We Came From[1], first in Jaipur Literature Festival in 2019 and next at Mathrubhoomi Literature Festival in January, 2020 at Thivanthapuram.  I had a lengthy discussion about his understanding of goats, buffalos, cows and so on,  caste and race relations in ancient India[Read More…]

by 26/06/2020 Comments are Disabled Book Review
Why Dalit Lives Do Not Matter?

Why Dalit Lives Do Not Matter?

A teenaged Dalit boy was shot dead at his home in Uttar Pradesh’s Domkhera village in Amroha district at a time when the Black Lives Matter movement was shaking the whole world. He was shot dead allegedly by youths from an upper caste community for visiting a temple in the village, according to media reports. Such killing of Dalits in[Read More…]

Manifesto For English Education For A Post Corona India

Manifesto For English Education For A Post Corona India

Post corona India will be more poverty-ridden. Poverty will expand the scope of inequality as we have seen how inequality exists between Ambanis, Adani and other monopoly capitalists on the one hand and the 250 million migrant workers who walked thousands of miles without food, with children and old women dying and suffering on the national high ways on the[Read More…]

by 08/06/2020 Comments are Disabled India
Jaganmohan Reddy’s Fight To Impart English Education In Government Schools Met With Resistance

Jaganmohan Reddy’s Fight To Impart English Education In Government Schools Met With Resistance

Human equality is a major problem of India. Historically ownership of property created human inequality in all countries. Caste gradations in education also created an unbridgeable inequality in India. This inequality has been carried very successfully to modern India through caste system and education. Fighting for human equality from power is more difficult than fighting from civil society even in[Read More…]

by 02/06/2020 Comments are Disabled India
Shall We Change The Status Of Safai Sainiks Now?  | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

Shall We Change The Status Of Safai Sainiks Now? | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

Corona attack on India seems to have suddenly changed our understanding of Safai karmacharis of India. They are now seen as desh bhakts even by those who never recognized their desh bhakti. When the life of rich who treated them lowly and unworthy of respect and dignity are in danger as never before, they are recognizing what I call the[Read More…]

by 29/04/2020 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
 “State Is The March Of God On Earth”: Re-examining Hegel In Times Of Corona Crisis

 “State Is The March Of God On Earth”: Re-examining Hegel In Times Of Corona Crisis

Famous German philosopher G.W.F. Hegel was the first philosopher who linked social science and natural science by applying the principle of Thesis, Anti-Thesis and Synthesis. He effectively separated State and Religion while allowing them to function in their separate spheres. and advanced the scientific thinking of modern world. In these times of coronavirus war on humanity, we must understand his[Read More…]

by 17/04/2020 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
Disease Distancing, Not “Social Distancing” | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

Disease Distancing, Not “Social Distancing” | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

Ever since the Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, announced national lock down on March 24, 2020 to fight Covid–19 and declared that “Social Distancing” is the only solution to save India from the Corona Pandemic, all Chief Ministers are also using the same coinage in  India. We must use ‘Disease Distancing’ not Social Distancing because India is a country of social[Read More…]

How To Save The Nation Sitting At Home | Kancha Ilaiah Shepehrd

How To Save The Nation Sitting At Home | Kancha Ilaiah Shepehrd

We are all house arrested now because of Coronavirus for our own safety. We do not know how to live like this. In India and in many countries during lock down period people do not know how to spend time at home and use it for personal and community benefit. The famous American astronaut Scott Kelly who spent one year[Read More…]

by 27/03/2020 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
How Did Indian Masses Cope With 1897 Plague Pandemic? |Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

How Did Indian Masses Cope With 1897 Plague Pandemic? |Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

Covid -19 has shaken the globalized world in a manner that it  never knew before. Having taken its birth in Wuhan, China its first attack focused on air conditioned travel life. The patient data of India so far shows that all those  first phase Covid-19 positive persons were those who traveled by long hour air crafts. The second line attack[Read More…]

by 24/03/2020 Comments are Disabled India
Lessons That Amrutha Taught Society

Lessons That Amrutha Taught Society

On September 14, 2018 Perumalla Pranay, a Dalit young man of 24 was hacked to death in Miryalaguda, Telanaga in front of his pregnant wife Amrutha. Amrutha belongs to Arya Vaishy family and got married to him in defiance of her father, Maruthirao. Amrutha is about 25 now and only daughter of her rich parents. Her father has massive property that he enmassed trough real estate business and other means. According the police who[Read More…]

by 13/03/2020 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
The Dilemma Of RSS/BJP In Higher Education | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

The Dilemma Of RSS/BJP In Higher Education | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

The State run universities in India have created a major crisis in the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and Bharatiya Janatha Party (BJP)  rule and their ideological apparatus. On the one hand the present right wing regime which believes in traditional Vernadharma parmapara centered education cannot accept the present reservation system, which they opposed from the days of Ambedkar-Gandhi Poona Pact. Even[Read More…]

by 03/03/2020 Comments are Disabled India
Why Walls Around Gujarat Model Of Development? | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

Why Walls Around Gujarat Model Of Development? | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

Assume that Donald Trump is coming to address ‘Namasthe Trump’ meeting in Hyderabad or Vishkhapatnam or Bangaluru or to Chennai or Cochin there would not have been a need for building walls around the slums on the way to Airport or to his hotel or to the stadium where he addresses the meeting. But in Ahamedabad there is such a[Read More…]

by 22/02/2020 Comments are Disabled India
Ambedkar And Martin Luther King: The Giant Epoch Makers | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

Ambedkar And Martin Luther King: The Giant Epoch Makers | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

The Ambedkar-King Study Circle of the United States of America by asking me to give a keynote on the occasion of its Annual Conference 2019, gave me a great opportunity to compare the life and work of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar and Martin Luther King Jr. This gives me an opportunity, particularly, to examine their role in expanding the spiritual democratic[Read More…]

by 15/02/2020 Comments are Disabled Human Rights
Are OBCs Not Eligible To Be On Sri Ram Temple Trust? | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

Are OBCs Not Eligible To Be On Sri Ram Temple Trust? | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

After the Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the Ram temple trust the former Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, who over saw the Babri Msjid  destruction, Kalyan Singh and Uma Bharati, who actively participated in that act, said that the Other Backward Classes (Shudra/ OBCs) are as much Ram Bhakts as Dalits are and demanded for inclusion of an OBC member[Read More…]

by 13/02/2020 Comments are Disabled India
Equality Labs Chases The Mother Of Inequality (Brahminism) In America | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

Equality Labs Chases The Mother Of Inequality (Brahminism) In America | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

To the utter shock of American Brahminism an unusual organization called Equality Labs came into being in New York. IT was  established by second generation, American born, Dalit women activists to chase it in America in every sphere of life, including in the digital media. Thenmozhi Soundararajan and few other US born citizens with amazing talents and were told by[Read More…]

Make Reading Preamble of the Constitution Compulsory | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

Make Reading Preamble of the Constitution Compulsory | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

The Government of Maharastra has made reading Preamble of the constitution compulsory in the school assembly meetings every morning. From primary school to high school, students must remind themselves that they live in a democracy under this constitution. This is a great nationalist step. Every state Government in the country must do this needful thing at this juncture of our[Read More…]

by 28/01/2020 Comments are Disabled India
Why RSS/BJP Hate JNU And Social Sciences?

Why RSS/BJP Hate JNU And Social Sciences?

The attack by masked forces, who were freely allowed to enter the JNU campus and injured teachers and students tell a new story of the BJP rule in Delhi. It is likely that they want to dismantle JNU and some other universities in the country. Rastriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and Bharatiya Janatha Party (BJP) have major issues with universities that teach[Read More…]

by 11/01/2020 1 comment India
Attack On Students and Teachers: Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd Withdraws From New Indian Express Conclave

Attack On Students and Teachers: Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd Withdraws From New Indian Express Conclave

To, Mr. Prabhu Chawla Editorial Director New Indian Express Chennai. Dear Mr. Prabhu Chawla You have invited me to speak in a panel on 8 January in the Educational Conclave you are organizing. You have been organizing this conclave on education called ThinkEdu for quite some time. This year invitation said: ‘It is my honour to invite you to speak[Read More…]

by 07/01/2020 2 comments India
Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd Condemns Attack on JNU Teachers and Students

Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd Condemns Attack on JNU Teachers and Students

I strongly condemn the brutal attack on JNU Teachers and Students on 5 January, 2020. Under the present BJP/RSS rule unusual levels of violence has been let loose on campuses. For the first time in higher education history after independence masked forces with lethal weapons entered the campus and brutally beat teachers and students. This signals a new level of[Read More…]

by 06/01/2020 Comments are Disabled India
Rahul Gandhi (C), President of India's main opposition Congress party, his mother and leader of the party Sonia Gandhi and India's former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh (R) display copies of their party's election manifesto for the April/May general election in New Delhi, India, April 2, 2019. REUTERS/Adnan Abidi

A Shudra Appeal To Congress

I am a Shudra by birth and a son of shepherd mother and father. My parents and ancestors were meat and milk producers. Their contribution to the nation was through building a food resource and wool based industry and market. They were not Muslims but their occupation was exactly like that of the Kashmiri Muslims—sheep and goat rearing and wool[Read More…]

by 27/12/2019 Comments are Disabled India
RSS/BJP Ideology Is No Spiritual Citizenship To Shudras And No National Citizenship To Muslims

RSS/BJP Ideology Is No Spiritual Citizenship To Shudras And No National Citizenship To Muslims

The Hindutva, a political child of the Brahminic Hindu religion, denied spiritual citizenship to Shudras historically. Now it has decided to deny national citizenship to Muslims. The Brahmin/Bania forces want to consolidate their power with an iron grip on all sections of India by denying basic citizenship to different sections of India in different modes. Shudras and Dalits were denied[Read More…]

by 23/12/2019 4 comments India
The Question That Won A Big Battle

The Question That Won A Big Battle

In Andhra Pradesh Assembly the anti-English medium, opposition leader, Nara Chandrababu Naidu, surrendered in a debate on 12 December, 2019. He said “we are not opposing introduction of English medium in Government schools’. With this surrender all his supporting media network, street dharna teams,the forces of pro-private English medium schools will now follow the suit. Thepro-English medium in Government schools[Read More…]

by 19/12/2019 Comments are Disabled India
How To End Rapism In India?

How To End Rapism In India?

The culture of raping women both for personal gratification of persons involved or as a weapon of oppression is killing the public morale of the nation within and globally. The brutal gang rape of Disha at Hyderabd on 27 November, 2019 re-enacted the worst case of Nirbhaya in Delhi seven years ago. In Delhi it was a gruesome killing of[Read More…]

by 11/12/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Do English Educated Become Christians?

Do English Educated Become Christians?

The Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y.S.Jaganmohan Reddy remained firm on the question of introducing English medium in Government schools and issued the orders to start the new education programme from 2020-21 academic year. Since then a new theory has been floated by forces that do not want the children of the poor and lower castes learn English. They do not[Read More…]

by 05/12/2019 1 comment India
Countering Hypocrisy of Ruling Class on English Medium Education in Government Schools

Countering Hypocrisy of Ruling Class on English Medium Education in Government Schools

The Y.S.Jaganmohan Reddy Government recently issued orders for implementation of English medium in Government schools from the academic year 2020-21. It said that from next academic year from class 1 to 6th all Government schools will teach in English medium with one subject compulsory in Telugu. The orders are issued almost seven months in advance before the academic year starts.[Read More…]

by 12/11/2019 Comments are Disabled India
BJP’s Linguistic Agenda Is Antithetical to Progress and Education

BJP’s Linguistic Agenda Is Antithetical to Progress and Education

Whom exactly does Amit Shah want to impose the learning of Hindi on in south India and the northeast? Clearly, this proposal is only applicable to poor children in villages who study at government schools. A few days ago, I was giving lectures around the Silicon Valley in California. The IT hub of the world, the Silicon Valley is the[Read More…]

by 08/10/2019 Comments are Disabled India
RSS admits Christian women are better educated: time to drop anti-conversion laws

RSS admits Christian women are better educated: time to drop anti-conversion laws

It was a pleasant surprise last week to come across a news report about the findings of a survey done by what was described as a ‘RSS think tank’ on the status of women in India. Besides claiming that married women and women who seek spiritual help are happier than others, it also acknowledged that employment was found to be[Read More…]

by 02/10/2019 Comments are Disabled India
How Much Grip Does Hinduism Has On Indian Communists? | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

How Much Grip Does Hinduism Has On Indian Communists? | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

The role of Hindu religion on the Indian state and governing forces is coming up for more and more discussion after the Bharatiya Janatha Party and the Rastriya Swayamsevak Sangh came to power in 2014 and 2019. However, one also needs to examine whether Hinduism has its grip on Indian communists. Only then we can understand their role around caste[Read More…]

by 23/09/2019 1 comment India
Equality Is UnIndian: How To Make It Indian Is The Question | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

Equality Is UnIndian: How To Make It Indian Is The Question | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

In my village in my childhood and now there was/is one common practice. Each occupation is performed by a single community. Each community has its own name. Tilling the land, shepherding or cattle rearing, fishing, toddy tapping, pot making, cloth washing, clothe weaving, barbering and chappal making, including handling of dead bodies of animals or humans are done by each[Read More…]

Will The Left Survive In India? | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

Will The Left Survive In India? | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

2019 elections have hit the left parties harder than even the Congress. Though Prime Minister Narendra Modi talks about the Congress Mukth Bharat, historically the Rastriya Swayamsevak Sangh and the Bharatiya Janatha Party wanted a Communist Mukth Bharat for definite. That is their stated long standing ideological position. They seem to be achieving this with a comprehensive understanding. The communists,[Read More…]

by 20/07/2019 4 comments India
Intermedia Must Be Abolished In Two States | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

Intermedia Must Be Abolished In Two States | Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

The intermediate examination board of Telangana has created a massive systemic crisis. About 20 students have already committed suicide and many more are likely to die. The solution to this problem does not lie in just recounting the marks in the answer sheets nor does it lie in the revaluation of answer sheets. The problem is much bigger. It is[Read More…]

by 27/04/2019 1 comment India
Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd – Shudras Never Were Allowed To Learn A National Language

Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd – Shudras Never Were Allowed To Learn A National Language

In the recent Parliament elections in the two Telugu states there was an interesting discussion: who speaks good English whether Chandrbabu Naidu or Jaganmohan Reddy or KCR? Three of them are Shudras. Chandrababu Naidu and KCR are first generation English learners, whereas Jaganmohan Reddy is a second generation English medium educated leader, as his father was a doctor and could[Read More…]

by 23/04/2019 Comments are Disabled India
The young man standing in bush shirt

First Dalit Collector Who Changed A Feudal District In The 1970s

Next to Hyderabad, Warangal is the second biggest city of the Telangana state. Most of the present Telangana state’s heritage symbols, Kakatiya Gate, and its tank based irrigation system go back to the history of Warangal, which, in the medieval and pre-medieval Telugu, was known as Orugallu. After this town became the capital of the famous Kakatiya dynasty in the[Read More…]

10 Percent EWS Reservation And The Unreserved Shudras

10 Percent EWS Reservation And The Unreserved Shudras

After the central Government has reserved 10 percent seats to the castes of general category the Andhra Pradesh Government brought out a GO allocating 5 percent of the seats and jobs to only Kapu community of the state. The remaining 5 percent is meant for the other unreserved castes. As it is well known that the Kapus have been fighting[Read More…]

by 14/02/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Anand Teltumbde was arrested over the Bhima Koregaon case – A Celebration he strongly opposes

Anand Teltumbde was arrested over the Bhima Koregaon case – A Celebration he strongly opposes

Teltumbde is a popular Dalit scholar and activist and his writings expressing deep disagreements with Maoists are very much in the public sphere. How did the state miss seeing them? On February 2, Dalit scholar and intellectual Anand Teltumbde was arrested from Mumbai domestic airport by the Pune police around 3:30am — very promptly after his anticipatory bail petition was[Read More…]

by 06/02/2019 2 comments Human Rights
Pinarayi Vijayan’s Social Reform Has Defeated the Sabarimala Protests

Pinarayi Vijayan’s Social Reform Has Defeated the Sabarimala Protests

After the Ayyapa jatara ended on January 14 with the so called ‘Makara Jyothi’ appearing for the devotees at Sabarimala, Pinarayi Vijayan, the chief minister of the Left front government, emerged a skillful social reformer and good administrator. The Narendra Modi government deployed its Kerala wing to push him against a wall by opposing the implementation of the Supreme Court judgment in 2018 lifting the ban[Read More…]

by 19/01/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Harappa To Ayyappa

Harappa To Ayyappa

Harappa! We are all your descendants You shepherded the first civilization You built the first city in the East You domesticated the early animals Goat, sheep, buffalo, dog and donkey. You made the first pot, brick, bronze tools You built the first tank, boat and building. You were God’s Own Man. Brahma came and burnt all your civilization Indra damaged[Read More…]

by 14/01/2019 Comments are Disabled India, Arts/Literature
Sabarimala row: While he defends ‘tradition’, will PM Modi also guarantee protection to Bindu and Kanakadurga?

Sabarimala row: While he defends ‘tradition’, will PM Modi also guarantee protection to Bindu and Kanakadurga?

The entry of two women devotees, Bindu and Kanakadurga, into the sanctum sanctorum of the Sabarimala temple on January 2 led to widespread violence in the state of Kerala. The violence, which erupted during the bandh call issued by the BJP and allied organisations on January 3, saw not just damage of public property but also the loss of a[Read More…]

by 09/01/2019 Comments are Disabled India
Why Pinarayi Vijayan must take the RSS-BJP head-on in the Sabarimala fight. The fight is now for more than the one temple

Why Pinarayi Vijayan must take the RSS-BJP head-on in the Sabarimala fight. The fight is now for more than the one temple

In rural Andhra Pradesh, there is a proverb that is reportedly used by rapists against their victims, “Allow me to rape you — or I’ll cut my own organ [presumably, the penis].” The saying reflects deep-seated misogyny and chauvinistic tendencies. The threat of self-immolation now emerging from Thiruvananthapuram against the Supreme Court order that allowed women of all age groups[Read More…]

by 19/12/2018 Comments are Disabled India
RSS/BJP And The Shudra Neo-Slaves

RSS/BJP And The Shudra Neo-Slaves

What is the status of Shudras who constitute the largest social bloc in India? In the North India, the Yadavs, Kurmis of Bihar, Yadavs and Jats of Uttar Pradesh, Gujjars of Rajsthan, the Shudras of Bengal, who are still outside the bracket of Bhadralok, the Patels of Gujarat, Marathas and Kumbis of Maharashtra, Lingayats, Vakkalingas of Karanataka, Nairs and Menons[Read More…]

Preface To Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd’s Autobiography “From A Shepherd Boy To An Intellectual–My Memoirs”

Preface To Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd’s Autobiography “From A Shepherd Boy To An Intellectual–My Memoirs”

  This is  the Preface of the just released Autobiography of Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd entitled “From A Shepherd Boy To An Intellectual–My Memoirs”. Published by Samya/Sage (Select) New Delhi. Countercurrents reproduces the introduction.   PREFACE I never intended to write a memoir. My two books Why I Am Not a Hindu and Post-Hindu India, generated debate and controversy among the Brahmin-Baniya[Read More…]

Delhi University Proposes To Remove My Books From The Syllabus

Delhi University Proposes To Remove My Books From The Syllabus

The meeting of the Delhi University Standing Committee for Academic Affairs, according to media reports, in its meeting on 24 October, 2018 has recommended to drop teaching of my three books for M.A. Political Science course. The three books are ‘Why I am not a Hindu’, ‘God as Political Philosopher: Buddha’s Challenge to Brahminism’; and ‘Post-Hindu India: A Discourse in[Read More…]

Shabarimala Temple Entry: All Shudras Must Oppose  NSS Manuvadam

Shabarimala Temple Entry: All Shudras Must Oppose  NSS Manuvadam

  The Nair Service Society (NSS) is supporting the most destructive anti-women Anti-Shudra Manuvadam in the name of Shabarimala temple’s sanctity . The Nair men for centuries surrendered the Nair women’s self respect to the Brahmin males in worst Manuvadi system called Sambandam.  The Brahmin men exploited the Nair women worse than the slave masters exploited the African American women[Read More…]

A Call  To Shudra/OBC/SC/STs To Celebrate October 5 As Indian English Day

A Call  To Shudra/OBC/SC/STs To Celebrate October 5 As Indian English Day

I appeal to all the Shudra/OBC/SC/STs to celebrate the Indian English Day on 5 October, 2018 as we have no significant place in the world of English even after 201 years of English education in India. The first ever Indian English school was started in 1817 in October by William Carey and Rajram Mohan Roy. But the Shudra/OBC/SC/STs are excluded[Read More…]

How Vedic Brahminism Stunted The Development Of Sciences

How Vedic Brahminism Stunted The Development Of Sciences

After the Bharatiya Janatha Party came to power and ruled the nation for two terms from 1999-2004 and 2014 to present a lot of propaganda by the Brahminic pundits belonging to that ideology clamour that all modern sciences, originated in Europe, America and China and Japan is no match to the Vedic science that the ancient Brahminism has built. Particularly[Read More…]

How Brahmins Negated The Progress of India

How Brahmins Negated The Progress of India

In my earlier article “Shudras Built The Indus Valley Civilization!”   I argued that the Agni and Vayu worshipping Rigvedic Aryans might have caused the destruction of 1500 years of Harappan and post-Harappan civilization. My broad thesis that the South Indian names and spiritual cultures match with the productive and spiritual cultures of Harappan civilization is confirmed by the DNA analysis[Read More…]

Shudras Built The Indus Valley Civilization!

Shudras Built The Indus Valley Civilization!

The archaeological evidence shows that the first ever city—Harappa– was built in the Indian Sub-continent around 2850-2900 Before Christ in the world. The name Harappa sounds like a South Indian divine man’s name among agrarian and cattle herding communities. For example, Mallappa, Beerappa, Veerappa are very famous names in South India. In Kannada and Telugu regions the names that end[Read More…]

While Kerala Is Under Flood Waters The Right Wing Is Spewing Venom!

While Kerala Is Under Flood Waters The Right Wing Is Spewing Venom!

Kerala is reeling under the worst ever floods in its history. Since this is state that has a long sea coast and many rivers the unprecedented flooding has damaged the whole economy of the State. Hundreds of people died, thousands of cattle died. Several thousands of people are trapped in the inaccessible flood waters. When I enquired from friends living[Read More…]

by 19/08/2018 1 comment India
What Is My Philosophy? -Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

What Is My Philosophy? -Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

After I wrote Why I am Not a Hindu and Post-Hindu India  the Brahmin- Banias ( the castes that control Hindu spiritual system and the whole business system of India) communities of Telugu states threatened to kill me. Several cases were filed against me. The intellectuals from these two most wealthy and most educated communities ask me: What is your[Read More…]

India’s Dalit Spring, The OBCs And The Hindutva Game Plan – Kancha Ilaiah

India’s Dalit Spring, The OBCs And The Hindutva Game Plan – Kancha Ilaiah

The other day a friend of mine said “What India is witnessing is a rule of radical Hinduism, like radical Islamic, radical Christian and radical Buddhist rule in the world at different phases. In any radical religious party or organization’s rule democracy does not survive”. I did some research on this question of radical religion ruling the state and its[Read More…]

T-MASS: A New Experiment In Ambedkarite-Marxist Alliance

T-MASS: A New Experiment In Ambedkarite-Marxist Alliance

  The newly formed organization popularly called T-MASS is a registered organization under the Telangana Government’s Registration Act with a name “Telangana Mass and Social Organizations”. Under its broad umbrella many Ambedkarist, Phuleite, communist, humanist, women organizations are working with a broad philosophical framework of Mahatma Phule, Ambedkar and Karl Marx. Its banners always carry the portraits of these thinkers[Read More…]

Ambrose Pinto: A God’s Man Who Walked The Talk

Ambrose Pinto: A God’s Man Who Walked The Talk

  Ambrose pinto’s death after struggling with treacherous cancer for about Six months on 3 January of 2018 made me feel that this year would be bad for Dalits. His smiling face, hopeful of change, keeps flashing through my mind. I last met him when I gave a special lecture at Indian Social Institute Benuluru on January 20, 2017, in[Read More…]

Why I’m Denied My Right Of Speech? – Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

Why I’m Denied My Right Of Speech? – Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd

In spite of the fact that the Supreme Court of India in its three judge bench judgment on October 12, 2017 said that my book ‘Smajika Smugglerlu-Komatollu’ cannot be banned, the Arya Vysyas of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh are trying to attack me wherever I go to speak in meetings and seminars. The latest is their attempt at Khammam on[Read More…]

by 04/12/2017 3 comments India
Kancha Ilaiah & his controversial book Samajika Smugglurlu Komatollu

What Does Jai Sriram Poster Mean?

  As the debate on the Arya-Vysya attack against me was taking place at the national and international level two things have happened. One, the Chandrababu Naidu Government in alliance with BJP in Andhra Pradesh arrested me in my home on 28 October, so that I would not go to Vijayawada (Amaravathi) and attend the public meeting. This public meeting[Read More…]

by 20/11/2017 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
Posters Appear Threatening To Kill Dr Kancha Ilaiah

Posters Appear Threatening To Kill Dr Kancha Ilaiah

Dr Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd whose book “Smajika Smugglerlu: Komatollu’’ angered the Hindutva forces posted threatening posters in front of his house. According to Dr Kancha Ilaiah these posters which appeared on 4th November night is a warning to attack or kill him. He has filed a complaint to The Station House Officer, Osmania University, Hyderabad. Here is the full text[Read More…]

Kancha Ilaiah & his controversial book Samajika Smugglurlu Komatollu

BJP’s Two Dramas And Nationalism

  The Sangh Parivar elements that worked hand in glove with Arya Vysyas, who wanted to lynch me at Parkal on 23 September, after the TDP Parliament member T.G Venkatesh issued a threat on 17thSeptember came with true colours.  They caught hold of just 22 year old Dalit boy, who sported big saffron tilak on his forehead and said that[Read More…]

by 07/11/2017 Comments are Disabled Annihilate Caste
Kancha Ilaiah & his controversial book Samajika Smugglurlu Komatollu

Clarification About My Association With Christians: Kancha Ilaiah

One of the recurring accusations of the recent Arya Vysya agitators and their associate Paripurnanada Swamy, a hater of St. Mother Theresa and Christian human service, against me is that I have a Christian agenda behind my writing. This is absolutely false. I have some academic association with an organization called the Good Shepherd Society that established an English medium[Read More…]

I Am Losing Faith: Kancha Ilaiah

I Am Losing Faith: Kancha Ilaiah

As I and Dr. Bheenaveni Ramaiah (Assistant Professor of Sociology, Osmania University), one of my relatives, my Driver narrowly missed a major murderous attack at Parakal, Bhupalpally district on 23/9/2017 by the Arya-Vysya forces at 4.45 pm. In this context, I am issuing this statement. They were about 30 and more people with big stones in their hands at the[Read More…]

by 25/09/2017 13 comments India
Threat To Kill Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd By TDP M.P T.G Venkatesh

Threat To Kill Kancha Ilaiah Shepherd By TDP M.P T.G Venkatesh

T.G. Venaktesh, an extremist Arya Vysya leader held a press conference on 18/9/2017 in a luxury hotel in Hyderabad with an extremist, conspitorial Arya Vysya team and issued a threat against me that he would kill or hang me in the streets. This person is an MP from the TDP and supposed be the richest man after Gandi Madhava Rao[Read More…]

by 19/09/2017 3 comments India
What Is Social Smuggling?

What Is Social Smuggling?

The concept Social Smuggling I coined in my book Post-Hindu India (Sage 2009) has generated a law and order issue, created by the Arya Vysya organizations of the two Telugu States. The Vysya Associations have issued a death threat to me for applying this concept to the Vysya model of caste based business historically leading to a massive amount of[Read More…]