Caste divisions are a problem at UK universities, say students and academics, as institutions in the US take steps to tackle caste-based discrimination.
In South Asian countries, members of lower caste communities, such as Dalits, have historically faced discrimination and exclusion. As emigration out of this region continues, these divisions and the resulting prejudices persist abroad.
Following concerns about discrimination among international student populations, some US institutions have begun to introduce protections for lower-caste students. In December 2022, Brown University added a clause to its nondiscrimination policy explicitly prohibiting caste oppression. Now, California State University and Harvard University have both followed suit.
At the time, Sylvia Carey-Butler, Brown’s vice president for institutional equity and diversity, said as the South Asian population in the US increases, caste discrimination is a growing issue on college and university campuses across the country.
With more Indians choosing to study in the UK, students told The PIE News that caste divisions are also an issue at British universities, often presenting in subtle ways.
Asang Wankhede, a student at the University of Oxford who is from a Dalit community in India, said he felt isolated when studying with other students from higher-castes.
“They would have their own groups where they would only mingle,” Wankhede said.
He told The PIE that higher caste students would try to “discredit” and “cancel” Dalit students like him. He was told he did not have the ‘merit’ to study at Oxford and had capitalised on his caste identity to secure a place at the university, rather than earning it fairly.
Another student spread rumours about Wankhede’s “inappropriate” behaviour at an event he didn’t attend. After he complained to the university and the matter was investigated, the student was issued with a warning.
“Caste-based discrimination exists quite rampantly across UK universities”
“These blatant false allegations and caste-hate pushed me towards contemplating committing self-harm and suicide,” he said.
Wankhede also said he saw other Dalit students being harassed and abused for speaking out about caste discrimination, including at other universities.
“Caste-based discrimination exists quite rampantly across UK universities and education spaces,” Wankhede said.
While parts of the US are becoming increasingly conscious of caste discrimination, with California lawmakers currently considering a bill that would outlaw this, the UK rejected the option of making caste a protected characteristic when updating the Equality Act in 2018.
“The way caste discrimination operates in small towns and villages in India is very different from how it happens in universities,” said Sumit Samos, a former student at the University of Oxford.
“The moment I entered the classroom, I realised I was different than most Indians and Pakistanis there,” he told The PIE. “Once you start to speak, then people figure it out as to which caste you belong to because I would talk about icons and movements and political leaders from marginalised communities.”
Like Wankhede, Sumit said that he felt excluded by upper-caste students as they would only spend time with one another. “It’s a very grey area because if they don’t want to hang out with you, they can just say it’s personal differences, it’s not about caste,” he said.
Arun Kumar, a senior lecturer in Global Development and Management at King’s College London, said, “Knowing how caste operates in institutional settings, often in coded ways that are not immediately visible or comprehensible to outsiders, there is bound to be caste-based discrimination being experienced by Dalit [or] Bahujan students in the UK.”
Over 126,000 Indians were studying in the UK in 2021/22. With numbers set to continue growing, Kumar said the issue of caste discrimination is likely to worsen.
“There is very little institutional understanding around caste-based discrimination, which means that even when students experience and raise discrimination, there is little support available to them,” he said.
“In most cases the upper-caste students and faculty from South Asia, who would have good understanding of caste, work quite actively to feign ignorance in order to suppress such issues from being raised altogether,” he added.
The University of Oxford did not respond to requests for comment.
