A Dalit teenager committed suicide in a Narva village last on January 5th after he mistakenly dialed a wrong number. The number belonged to an upper caste girl and her brother allegedly assaulted and abused him for calling a Rajput house. This unintentional phone call followed by the abuse forced the teenager to hang himself to death. He hanged himself on Friday around 4 PM.
“The girl’s brother, Shaitan Singh, called back to ask who he was and where he was speaking from. My brother told Singh his name and address,” said Revat Ram, who belongs to the Meghwal community.
It all started with an unintended phone call. Shaitan Singh delivered some casteist abuses over the phone call. “On Friday morning, he and two other men came to our house and slapped Ravi several times and pushed my mother. They also threatened him that they would kill him if he is seen around the village,” the brother said.
Ravi was traumatized after the threats and was afraid to go out of his house. He was even scared to go to school as Singh’s home was on the way.
The incident is an eye-opener to the rotting, age-old culture of discriminating with respect to caste. Although caste-based discrimination was banned in India in 1955, but centuries-old attitudes persist and low-caste people still face prejudice and attacks, particularly in rural areas. The oppression on the Dalits have resurfaced after such incidents and it has triggered the anger among the Dalit community. They camped outside the mortuary for two days and refused an autopsy, demanding immediate arrest of the accused. They cremated the boy on Monday evening after police assured them to take over the case.
