Caste, Privacy, & Digital Technologies (Manoj Mitta & Nikita Sonavane) | #PrivacySupreme 2023

hi everyone thank you for being here today uh I just want to start by saying that uh neither Manoj nor I are experts on technology uh if anything my greatest achievement is being able to run my computer so uh that speaks to a lot of my uh you know my ability to navigate technology but what we uh have thought about in things that we have considered about and uh questions that we will be engaging with today uh is thinking about the question of uh caste within the context of data and privacy so the sort of expanse of our discussion today I will speak to how caste is and has always been the sort of building blocks for data uh in India uh we want to then very briefly speak about how this is acquired a sort of digital form and we also want to in doing so reflect on the politics of creating data data collection and the various ways in which uh data has been both used to challenge and entrench uh cast-based hierarchies uh my work of course is on questions of policing I don't see policing and cast as being two separate entities so it's work on casters policing and not cast and policing as a lot of people like to refer to it and so I will reflect on how data and data building is a crucial part of the creation entrenchment and replication of casters policing in India and Manoj is here of course uh recently published much acclaimed book on uh cast and law an area uh study in inquiry that most lawyers are yet to apply their mind to so very excited to be in conversation Manoj thank you [Music] I am also very excited to interact with somebody who's so deeply involved in policing and this is Olimar because my research and writing on the subject taught me how when it comes to caste it's not just about police practically every section of society is deeply uncomfortable talking about it we and we recognize not all of us I mean the more Discerning the more honest ones recognize the reality of caste but as for most people I mean there is this a illusion that this is something we've got over it we have we are in the state of denial so I one of the aspects that I got to research was you know the intersection of Law and race in U.S and the intersection of Law and caste in India the thing one of the things that struck me was that there's far greater acknowledgment of that reality of the Persistence of race in the U.S Dan is the case in India of the corresponding Persistence of caste this shows in many ways and let me uh you know at this point mention that right now as a journalist it is very natural for me to think of what's on top of people's minds which we call newspeg new spec for this debate is the ongoing litigation first in the Patna High Court not too long ago early this month there was a judgment which many Saw as a very Progressive judgment and then there's a challenge to that in the Supreme Court from an organization called youth for equality the Judgment of the Patna high court was a green signal to the Bihar governments proposal of carrying out a caste census you may recall that about a decade ago in 2011 this was attempted for the first time or rather it was revived after a lapse of many decades the last caste census was done way back in 1931 and then there was a anywhere an interruption because of the world war there was no 41 census clearly and then 51 odd words after we became a republic it was decided that because we had reservations affirmative action essentially for scheduled cash and scheduled tribes at the national level we will be collecting data only on those two communities so there was a decision that there will be no need to take you know do a cast to get a sense of cast demographics across the board right but then post 90 after this bundle decision was made when reservations for sebcs or obc's as they are called who are essentially sudra part of the sudra community which as you all know there are four vernas uh chudra is the fourth one it doesn't mean they are one-fourth the top three vernas they Elite vernas the the twice born varnas they're actually very few in number it's the the dominant section of India's population is really sudras and in that shudra Varna the lower segment is the obc's the upper segment or the other what are called intermediate cars right so now the when the decision was made to extend affirmative action to obc's at the national level and then subsequently in various States especially in the north it was for the first time the need for accurate data on this was felt you know just as there were some information some data available for essays and STS there should be something for obc's also because after all uh so much of resources has been is being devoted to them we need to have a sense of what are the achievements what are the feelings is it working or how it can be fine-tuned and so on and so forth but far from recognizing that logic what was being said again and again by people in the current dispensation especially because the decision to revive the the caste sensors was taken by the previous governments in government but then before they got around to announcing the data there were some issues about I mean those apparently there were errors and so on before they could sort out those things there was a change of government now this government is very clear in its head that there will be no such data put put out and as it happened the 2021 census anyway could not take place this time because of kovid and as far as the 2011 data is concerned no we don't want to put it out because it's going to be divisive I mean some might find it ironic that this government finds caste demographics information user and not much of what they are themselves doing so that prompted some of the other parties most importantly Congress to take the position that okay we have a few states where we are ruling so Karnataka and elsewhere so we will try and do some senses there uh Stalin and the chief minister of Tamil Nadu said he would do it and nitish Kumar beat them all by coming out with this proposal last year and it was being rolled out this year when it became a subject of litigation now the important thing is sorry should I could I complete the point please go ahead you know there was something very interesting that happened when the matter came before The Supreme Court after the hike after the Patna High Court gave its green signal uh this um the you know the written submissions that uh this um youth for equality made before The Supreme Court says that the mandal Judgment the one that led to the you know that uh gave the green signal to the 1990 uh decision of the VP Singh government of introducing uh reservations for obc's now the mandal Judgment needs reconsideration uh is what uh this youth for equality says to the extent it holds that affirmative action can be based on caste now I found that very significant because when it goes on to say no person can be attributed a religion or caste as a birthmark the individual's choice of um faith belief and nature of work cannot be taken away by the circumstances of birth the fixing of caste by birth is perpetuation of jati and is antithetical to Verna now the distinction they are making between jati and Varna is actually a Trope that is that goes back two centuries you know I when I did this book which was referred to just now cast Pride battles for equality in Hindu India the battles I'm referring to are battles that were fought in the legal sphere this is about the intersection of Law and caste so these are all battles that are fought in legislatures and courts right so and these are not battles between say upper casts and lower Cuts Cars when I say it's in Hindu India what I meant was that this was these were battles essentially between two sets of Hindus liberal Progressive Hindus and conservative obscurantist Hindus now the latter's position was consistently you know that in the early Decades of uh in the in the 19th century and early Decades of the 20th century during the colonial period was that look this is all they were very unabashed in claiming that Varna system is all about birth well it's all about it's all birth based and on the other side uh you know those who try to give a liberal interpretation to our scriptures uh try to make it closer to the conception of class where there is some Mobility but then the problem was both were engaging in some wishful thinking when they would say in the subsequent decades that our scriptures were not really so rigid that they were not so unfair to lower cars because of late uh the ones who represented the Hindu right during the colonial period have been taking a diff have been singing a different tune they often say in bhagavad-gita there is this quote there's this sloka which says that you know caste is that where it Krishna is quoted as saying that I created Varna system on the basis of Guna and Karma now this was interpreted to mean that if you display a certain Guna and Karma you could on that basis belong to whichever caste that is applicable to you but in reality there is no such mechanism there's no such process there is no such precedent either I'm interrupting you here because I also think it's important to say is how this idea of Guna Karma then translates itself to law making of a certain kind through the manuscript right which is speaking to you know what is considered to be the code of conduct uh for people who are based you know depending on where you are located within the caste system and at the same time if you were to not toe the line then what is the kind of punishment that should be meted out to you for not adhering to the prescribed caste boundaries absolutely you know one glaring example of uh there being absolutely no basis to this Guna Karma Face Saver that you know the Hindu right has come up with in recent years is say the great shivaji you know right from medieval period uh we don't know how it was prior to that but we have this historically recorded example of Shiva shivaji who by any Reckoning ticked all the boxes of being a great shatria he was was acclaimed as an all-time great warrior he was also seen as a Visionary administrator and yet the brahmanas of his kingdom refused to anoint him as chatrapati a post that he wanted you know after escaping from the clutches of aurangzeb in Agra when he returned to his kingdom for strategic reasons he said now I should be in a position to deal on equal terms with Mughal Emperor I want to be anointed as chatrapati but of his kingdom refused so he had to get somebody all the way from Banaras to somehow circumvent that the reason that the brahmins of his kingdom refused was a very fancy theory that whatever the scriptures may say about the four varnas you know that are there the chaturvarana in Kali yoga there are only two varnas this is the claim that brahmins made right from shivaji's Days onwards they said that there are only brahmins that is I mean the elite who are are imbued with qualities of satwa and then there are these sudras the survival Community who are steeped in Thomas so there was in India according to them their own narrator there was nobody really with rajas the the martial qualities the qualities that were required to promote right so this was the kind of you know uh self-defeating uh uh claim that they made and this came to light in the 19th century when these debates that I was referring to in courts you know there was actually a case which went all the way to privy Council sorry let me complete this point yeah because a very interesting example it's very revealing um those who are those who want details you'll find them in this book now that preview Council judgment it was in a case that came from Bihar had to go into this question where these people rajputs who were reduced to appearing before these white judges in London uh asking them look you please tell us do we still exist or not do we shatriya still exist in this kalyuga in this Modern Age or not but why are we asking this because brahmins are saying that there are only brahmanas and sudras because it was very self-serving it meant that the rest of the Hindu Society was all you know way down in the hierarchy they were all impure and these guys were the only pure ones when they were very assertive about their own Heritage and said we are if we still exist it was it was that privy Council which had to give that ruling in 1850s and then on the other uh twice born Varna that is vaishyas the Banya Community the business Community They too had to go get a ruling and this was from Bombay High Court it was from none other than Justice who's otherwise a social reformer I'm going to have to come in here because I think they're waiting with baited breadth for us to come to data so we will put them out of there and sense of anticipation no but when you say about the caste census and uh I want to pick up on that because of course uh you know youth for equality ironically really you know an ironically named body one of the things that they argued in the Supreme Court uh is that you know having a or having caste senses or an exercise of this kind uh has the potential to make caste which is a very private kind of exercise a public matter right uh you know thrusting it into the public domain uh to which the bench responded and said that you know everybody knows each other's casts people also know their Neighbors cast so what what are you saying you know so and I want to and also drawing from something uh that you said right about caste as the birth mark I want to build on that idea uh in terms of how the police has been able to do this through data selection right police and policing and a sort of really glaring example of you know caste as being a birthmark and the sort of encoding of that through data has happened through the criminal tribes act but before I want I come to that I want to speak a little bit about how data collection has always been and when I say data collection I don't mean just you know data as an abstract entity but cast as data right so understanding of caste entrenching of caste building on one's understanding of caste has been very very crucial through data has been very crucial a crucial part of the policing project uh because you know so much of and there is this fantastic work for those who haven't read uh Radha Kumar's book called police matters she speaks to very very eloquently about other kind of data collection that the police was doing in the early colonial period uh where data is you know police data becomes the sort of Crux of understanding governmentality right so you know how districts are to be reshaped how many police stations will be where all of this is is on the basis of the kind of data that the police is generating and the police is also you know it's an incredibly smart institution I think we've been really unfair to them uh because they they have always been very good with knowing where their priorities lie you know so in 1902 when the police commission was set up although you know the police as an agency as a body was always been you know as they would say understaffed right so the number of people you are policing the population that you are policing and the number of police Personnel that ratio has been quite skewed but what the 1902 police commission report did and said is that we must cut down on police beats you know so this daily patrolling because what we are interested in doing and which is Central to the project of policing is that we want to create spaces and people who need to be policed and it's the creation of those objective policing which has happened through data and which has happened through this data which is located in caste right and to build on this further I want to speak to you know this sort of colonial invention because again you know one of the things that we really like doing particularly as lawyers is to say that the starting point of everything is coloniality right so everything was great and then the British came in in and then destroyed our perfectly lovely world but the British came in and not particularly Innovative chaps right so they were doing you know in other British colonies their habitual offenders you know criminal classes all of it so they come here and they say we need to replicate this year and they didn't have to put in too much effort because the caste system was there right so they started by saying you know we want to there is a category of people you know they say this is the first Colonial invention of crime which is the creation of the category of a thuggy and they said it began with a really specific definition to say is a person either robber who strangulates their victims with a silk scarf so very specific and then Central to this project of saying we need a thuggy is the setting up of what are called departments so what do tagi and dakiti departments do they collect data on people who are who they see as thugs right and a useful and a very important part of this characterization are people who are wondering because the idea is that people who are constantly on the move are very hard to watch are very hard to discipline and these also happen to be people who don't fall within the four forecast hierarchy right so the ones that you would call as being avarna uh or you know we would refer to as Stripes so nomadic semi-nomatic in nature to say these are the people that we need to watch and what is the kind of information that they collect right so they're collecting Intelligence on names characters manners of speech signs that thugs use to identify each other all of these things is information that they're collecting but what is very interesting to note here is that you're only collecting information on a certain kind of people right so while it you the puppeted project is to say we want to find data on criminality it is already this existing idea of criminality which is informing the collection of data so it's a it's a self-fulfilling prophecy because you're already seeing a certain kind of people as being criminals and being worthy of being policed right and then this category doesn't work out very well for them because it keeps growing and growing until one day you know some thuggy Department decides to declare brahmins as thugs right which is obviously a terrible idea we can never say out aloud that brahmins are thugs it's an Open Secret that we must all live with but so they say brahmins are thugs which is when they're done for and they said now we have to shut down this Enterprise apart and it gives rise to the old definition of criminals by birth when you go back to the good old wandering people and that is what has given rise to what we understand as policing in the modern sense right because the criminal tribes act allows for the Crux of it is you know you are a Criminal by birth and it's not just individuals I want to stress on this and we will you know discuss this as we go along is the idea of a family being a criminal right so it's people are put into settlements and a crucial part of this exercise is the maintenance of criminal tribes registers which has some really granular information on you know who you are who your friends are what do these people look like tracking their movements you know taking roll calls multiple times taking roll calls all of this information which then becomes a part of this register we we continue to know this now you know obviously popular culture has popularized in you know these kind this kind of language history sheet Rowdy sheet Gunda registers so terms like history sheeter Rowdy sheeter Gundam eater the next time you know we use them to describe somebody who we don't think fits you know in line with what social norms are we need to remember what is the origin story of this right and Radha Kumar also says how in Tamil Nadu there are registers like the marava register which is a cast so a criminal tribe register comes to be called the marava register now it also speaks to the spectacle of surveillance right because this is data that is perfectly being generated to surveillance for surveillance but this is data which is also made public so everybody knows there is a marwar register it's made public everybody knows who's on that register everybody knows who are criminal tribe is and everybody know because it's it's also very spatially demarcated right so it's also and I mean in the earlier conversation the one that shivangi was on she was speaking about criminal hotspots right crime hot spots think of it as your OG crime hotspot where your seeing that you know these are spaces that are we are going to confine certain communities to certain spaces and then because those communities are inhabiting those spaces those Spaces by default become unsafe spaces so how the idea of you know coalescing existing as a person belonging to an oppressed Community then becomes synonymous with being unsafe and therefore the category of crime right so I feel like it's really important to look at and see this history of data collection because I also want to push back against this idea which is very very often floated and particularly in the last you know over a decade or so which is that you know this you know data contributes to bias data contributes to bias I'm really sick of this because the data has always been biased the data is cast you know it is not pushing for a bias it was meant to be an encoding of that and evidence of that so it's really important for us to bear that in mind when we're seeing the data is biased because it it allows us to and allows for some people then to come and say oh let's think about what would a reformed caste system look like right what would it look like it would still be violent you know come in here yes of course yeah something about this data collection what I can't resist saying at this point is this instance of how India collect started collecting data on dalits they were called depressed classes then for the first time as a result of a resolution that was proposed in Parliament or what was then called Imperial legislative Council in 1916. you know for many years they were such as I said earlier there's such hypocrisy about caste it is a reality but we pretend that we are all we've all transcended it we know nothing about it right now this is not a modern phenomenon it was there earlier too and as it I mean this began with the very founding of Indian National Congress as you all know Congress was founded in 1885. in 1886 the then president of Congress this data by neurology laid down a policy for congress saying that there will be no discussion on caste there will be no resolutions relating to caste before Congress we will focus only on political issues nothing on social issues so and for therefore for many decades there was no discussion on it as a result of that Congress members who are part of the legislature never broached this subject at all it was left to an unknown Parsi legislator who was not from the Congress called manikji Dada Boy again another Dada boy whose role was just the reverse of what the earlier the other boys said he was the one who proposed it and there was vehement opposition to it from prominent Congress leaders who were the Hindu right of the time the you know um who were at different times presidents of congress party they opposed any discussion on it saying that you are offending our religious feelings let's not have any discussion on untouchability this is not a subject that should be discussed at all uh by before the legislature but the colonial Administration said okay since there is such payment opposition to it we they persuaded the other manager the other way to withdraw the resolution but promised to act on it uh the substance of it as a result they began to then start collecting data for the first time they sent out a circular to all the States you know please collect data on these depressed classes to understand what kind of disabilities they face what kind of measures special measures can be taken to ameliorate their lot so all that began after this discussion and in 1919 Madras for the first time set up what is known as protector of depressed classes which was the you know the earliest prototype of what we see today as say Ministry of Social empowerment or commission for scheduled class and so on that was the earliest body so that is when we began to collect data but then you see how at that time in 1916 there was such unease fetch discomfort betrayed by caste Hindus to the collection of data on uh dalits and here in 2023 we see similar uh discomfort being displayed by caste Hindus to collection of data on obc's the lower sudras again in relation to ameliorating their lot you know to see how the affirmative action is working but you you come up with all sorts of reasons I think you can't force cast entity on us as if we don't have cast as a reality it is because of this affirmative action that you have made us conscious of course no I think what the cast I think the OBC of course getting data on obc's would shift a lot of things around because it's a category that is perhaps one of the most heterogeneous categories right so dalit Muslims Christians tribes everybody that they couldn't put any anywhere are there but I think the anxiety about having this data is to food one is that it mid I think it really bursts the bubble of certain groups who have for a very long time historically masqueraded as the general category aka the Costless category so it allows us to name and assign cast to those who have always spoken about caste only in terms of dalits adivasis or sudras and secondly it also speaks to how that castlessness or the existence of being an uppercast slash castleis body has allowed them to amass resources and opportunities disproportionate to their numbers within the overall population and it gives and there's a danger of it giving a lot of political traction to yeah a very loaded term that is yeah yeah that we are the solidarity of dalits and bahujans yeah so all those kind of uh solidarities being pressure from yeah below coming up and you know blowing up this narrative yeah all those things I think it really turns this idea of you know what we've been saying this is majoritarian Rule majoritarian Rule it actually turns that narrative on its head to say that it's actually the rule of the minority yeah you know it's the rule of a really handful of minority who are calling the shots in multiple ways and then what it does is it bursts your bubble in terms of this category of the Hindu because you realize that it's actually just a conglomeration of caste you know and then I think it's that make believe category and not pushing for that make believe category to be dispelled uh is and doing you know safeguarding that is what uh the entire project is about because otherwise data collection is their favorite job uh I mean you know Hyderabad then there's a lot of work that has happened on Hyderabad and srinivasa is here so he can speak to this but one of them yeah we'll take a minute because there was a break so uh the idea I mean when Telangana became an independent state one of the first surveys that they did was the comprehensive family survey right it's very important to pay attention to you know it was supposed to be a Civic survey on 94 parameters but conducting a survey like that you know mapping people's family trees also tell you who tells you who is placed where in the caste hierarchy right and then that data then becomes the basis of all programs you know policing social welfare all of it so it's a it's it's that sort of marking of bodies uh that has been an exercise that I mean you're not going to call it the cast senses but you're still doing that and you're using that data to do precisely what the car census would have done yeah I think we should close and open for Q a yeah so we'll just take one question and I see one hand already up before I stood up so um okay we'll take both together a request please keep it as brief as possible and only questions any insights please do share with the speakers after the event right um thank you for the session was really great I'm janvi my question is from like a sociological point of view um it is when you talk about the intermingling of the words and adivasi and now solidarity has turned into an intersectional talk of in uh of um allyship so to say um within that what would be your comment on you use the vocabulary of that to be subliminally Castile or to be subliminally um non-progressive but now you have gained Progressive ontology which also just one second uh goes on to a policy framework in terms of how the ews uh reservation came into play and how it was talked about and how it was looked at so do you have comments about that we'll quickly take uh the question at the back and that's it sorry we've run over time thank you Nikita for bringing Telangana uh I think when you look at cast and data and sensors right I mean recent with secc and the Bihar sensors uh going to courts right when we talk about the upcoming sensors so we know Telangana census was kinda new but if you look at it critically it's the end of census right like you're through linking other from your birth and death you don't want to do 10-year census anymore you want to track every individual from their birth to death we are being marked stamped demarcated a body subbing track now what is it that you would think of a future of end of census I mean when you're talking about Colonial procedures and the historical aspects of caste and senses yes it's been completely replaced and I I can't think of it I I have to accept it I don't understand it enough to imagine a world where you are ending sensors the census of 2024 is going to be the end right now what would cause and how uh what sort of location the when you talk about sensors again you're also demarcating boundaries this is again coming back to delimitation of 26. so your thoughts on this would be great thank you for the questions yeah anyone yeah I'm not sure if I understood your question broadly I the sense I get is that um it makes us conscious of something that we uh in the interests of citizenship modernity should not be thinking so much about should not be so conscious about is that what you mean and uh when you use vocabulary like that to be subliminally casted in ways and to cover it up so um I'm not sure if I'm feeling it well but now you have the vocabulary of solidarity and allyship but in your everyday you're not making actual changes do not uh socialize within cast circles to not okay okay let me tell you at this point I am not a pundit I am a Storyteller so I have a story that comes to my mind is that when we abolished untouchability even at that time the discussion was look untouchability there are some people in the constituent assembly you pointed out that untouchability is actually a symptom uh the diseases cast so why are we not attempting to abolish caste so the answer to that there was even a committee that was set up diwakar committee committee to explore this question and the conclusion they came to was that look how do we ameliorate the lot of the ones who have been victims of caste system unless we recognize them as those who belong to that low position in that hierarchy so there is no getting away from it so this is a reality that we have to bear you know even if ideally we would not want to think and those who are in denial overcast as is commonly said it's a bit of a cliche that you are actually bittering your own privileged position you know so for those who are at the receiving end of caste they have no option but to you know be dealing with the mild effects of it and constantly grappling with that issue that Beast so it's a very difficult situation to be in there is something similar going on in the U.S too there's no bad reply to that

but that's the way it is that's the best I can say you can answer this yeah each University if I understand your question correctly your question is about you know what happens with the end of the census right and how so I I think that and of course with Hyderabad uh I think your question is that after 2024 there will be no further is that what you are saying that the that's the last time that I mean they have they haven't done the census for over a decade now anyway you're profiling individuals yeah from the birth you don't need a census anymore okay you're saying it's become a redundant exercise they won't do it either your plan has always been this yeah yeah no but I think that's the idea right like I think the census was perhaps the only form of data collection which one can say is a data collection that is drawing attention to our spelling out structures of power right every other form of data collection is derived from and used to entrench that same system and I think what they've been able to do that as a Russian particularly with technology and just in Hyderabad the kind of Madness that is there with you know you're constantly collecting data of different kinds you are also now merging data so it's a great mix and match with things like the mission chabutra where you know you are saying wandering youths you know people who are sitting in their mohalla you're picking them up you are taking their fingerprints so it's it's already that collection of data using that data to create disciplined bodies you know disciplined bodies who will toe the line that was always the plan right is you don't need to actually now you know the error of the policeman hitting people with a lot he is gone The Latte has been replaced with tabs you know in Hyderabad everybody says are the Telangana police walks out walks around with tabs so I think that kind of meaning making with making data and data collection Omni present has been allowed for them to sort of make this case to say that why is the separate data collection exercise required one and secondly what that then does is then that makes and centers like one is entrench is obviously the margins but also you know allow obfuscates the idea of what is it that is pushing for this to happen right like what I was saying earlier that obviously caste is an evolving category and certain people have been castless and the fact that now we are not there is no record of them in any way then allows for that costlessness to be further naturalized right to say oh you know this particular X location is a really safe location I feel so good there and that is that is that area is a problem or you know if you see a certain kind of person then you say mother this this person has a record now you can very clearly say um so that kind of navigation of people's world and world making is already happening and the way that you know I and my colleagues at the CPA project see it what we're seeing is now the rise in the creation of what we see as the digital Casper Opticon right it has always been the panoptical panopticon of caste now it is and the only sort of antithesis to it is having counter data which is in the form of census and which is why the state has come down on it uh in order to suppress the data in the kind of consistent and concerted manner that they have thank you so much thank you for taking such a pertinent yet unexplored issue thank you

2023-09-09 04:10

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