7 Slain As Violence Rocks The Caste System Of India

NEW DELHI - Sixty-one bodies lying amid the huts of the village of Lakshmanpur in eastern India served warning yesterday that the caste violence ravaging this country may be entering a new, more terrible phase.

The villagers, all from lower castes, were slain before dawn when a gang of 300 armed men descended on their hamlet and began firing into their huts. The killers shot and stabbed their victims for two hours; they left shouting Hindu slogans. Police said the gunmen appeared to be members of Ranbir Sena, a paramilitary group drawn from the region's higher-caste landlords.

The incident, the worst caste-related massacre in recent years, is at the violent edge of a transformation sweeping this country of 950 million people. India's centuries-old societal hierarchy, sanctioned by religion and enforced by tradition, is under assault from the masses at its lower rungs.

"What you are seeing is millions of people from the lower castes demanding dignity and respect for the first time and the higher castes refusing," said C.P. Bhambhri, a political scientist at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi. "India is sitting on a social volcano."

The massacre in Lakshmanpur is the latest in a string of caste-based killings. In July 1996, gunmen from Ranbir Sena gunned down 21 lower-caste villagers in Bihar. In March, higher-caste gunmen shot and killed 10 lower-caste villagers in Haibaspur. In September, 30 people who had been organizing lower-caste villagers were gunned down by a rival group.

Caste has been the organizing principle of Indian society and only recently has the system begun to crack.

Under the Hindu religion, embraced by more than 80 percent of the Indian population, each person is born into an immutable social category, experts say. It often dictates an individual's occupation, status and world view. While there are four main castes - warriors, priests, traders and laborers - there are thousands of sub-castes, including those for rat catchers and latrine cleaners.

And more than 100 million Indians fall outside of this system altogether: They are known as "untouchables" and for centuries have been regarded as unworthy of charity or even minimal contact.

While the Indian government formally outlawed the caste system almost five decades ago, it survives in varying forms, particularly in villages where more than 70 percent of the people live.

But in the past decade, lower castes have begun to enter politics and demand better treatment.

The state assembly in Bihar, the second-largest state in India, is now dominated by lower-caste elected officials. Earlier this year, Kocheril Raman Narayanan, became the country's first "untouchable" president.

In the fields, lower castes have demanded higher wages and land ownership.

Yesterday, two boats carrying 300 gunmen sailed across the Son River and onto the flat, fertile plain that holds the village of Lakshmanpur. Its population of 5,000, who live in mud huts with thatch roofs, is almost entirely made up of untouchables.

Witnesses said the gunmen killed the captains of their boats first, then set upon villagers.

With the two sides so bitterly at odds, police and experts say they expect the violence will go on. "This is a different India," Bhambhri said. "The untouchables are not going to go back to the old ways."