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n September 3, Kishore Chamar, a 35-year-old Dalit man, was lynched by a mob over allegations of cow slaughter in Kundeijuri village in Odisha.
His associate, Goutam Nayak, barely survived the assault. The cow in question was already dead, and both men—traditional cattle skinners by caste—were merely performing work their community has historically been forced into.
Not heeding their explanation, the mob had already passed its verdict. Chamar was dragged, thrashed and beaten to death. This was not cow vigilantism or a mob rage accident. It was caste violence in its most brutal form.
According to India’s National Crime Records Bureau, more than 57,000 crimes against Dalits were registered in 2022—an average of 156 complaints a day. Each of these represents a human being denied dignity, safety and rights. Between April and June 2025, Citizens for Justice and Peace documented 30 major atrocities across nine states. These included sexual assaults, murders and systematic social boycotts. These were not isolated aberrations; they represent a systemic rot that cuts across India’s political geography. For every registered crime, countless more go unreported due to fear, police complicity and social stigma.
Talking to The News on Sunday, Muhammad Ijaz, a professor at FAST National University, Lahore, said that these numbers did not merely show the failure of law enforcement. They demonstrated the failure of India’s democracy to protect its most vulnerable. He said that the caste system was often described as India’s “internal matter” and a relic of its past. “In reality, it is a daily machinery of oppression. Every lynching, every assault, every boycott is a violation of basic human rights—the right to life, dignity, equality and justice.”
Muhammad Usman Askari, chairperson of the Department of Political Science and International Affairs at the University of Management and Technology, says that internationally, India projects itself as the world’s largest democracy. “How can a country claim democratic credentials when 200 million of its people, nearly 17 percent of its population, live under constant threat of humiliation, violence and death? There can be no democracy with caste terror.”
Muhammad Ijaz says that India is not a democracy upholding its constitution but a state where caste supremacy is enforced with sticks, stones and impunity. Each mob attack corrodes constitutional promises of equality. “Each atrocity signals that justice is a privilege of upper castes, not a right for Dalits. The lynching of Kishore Chamar is a grim reminder. His death risks becoming another statistic filed away in police records unless confronted with moral urgency. To forget his name is to accept complicity in a system that normalises caste murder.”
Political and social voices have condemned the Odisha killing. Senior Congress leader Niranjan Patnaik accused the ruling BJP government of failing to protect marginalised communities. Dalit writer Lokesh Bag called the crime caste violence, not a cow dispute. Their words resonate with a larger warning: India cannot escape accountability by masking caste killings as “law-and-order issues” or “cow protection cases.” The root cause is caste hatred, emboldened by a political climate where majoritarian mobs dictate justice.
Senior Congress leader Niranjan Patnaik accused the BJP government of failing to protect marginalised communities. Dalit writer Lokesh Bag called the crime caste violence, not a cow dispute.
The killing of Chamar is not an isolated incident; it belongs to a systemic pattern of terror. Across Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, Dalits are routinely assaulted for drinking from public wells, riding horses at weddings or daring to enter temples. Women are targeted through sexual violence as a weapon of caste control. Social boycotts ensure economic strangulation of Dalit families who resist. Land grabs push entire communities into bonded labour. This is not random cruelty but a deeply structured violence. The caste system has evolved into a political tool, weaponised by extremist organisations and ignored by a judiciary and police system too often dominated by upper-caste privilege.
Muhammad Ijaz says India continues to boast of constitutional safeguards: reservations, Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, and affirmative action policies. Yet enforcement is often weak, delayed and sabotaged. Cases drag on for years while victims face intimidation. Police frequently refuse to register first information reports, or worse, side with the perpetrators. The gap between paper protections and lived reality is staggering. Equality exists only in legal texts; in practice, Dalits are treated as expendable.
Muhammad Usman Askari says: “Every atrocity carries a double violence: the act itself and the silence that follows. When mobs kill with impunity; when neighbours watch without intervening; when police dilute charges; and when courts delay justice, a collective crime emerges. From lynchings to humiliation, silence becomes endorsement. India’s civil society, media and political class must confront an uncomfortable truth: caste violence survives because it is tolerated.”
Muhammad Ijaz says the international community has often looked away, treating caste as a cultural issue rather than a human rights crisis. “This must end. Just as the world speaks against racial discrimination, apartheid or ethnic cleansing elsewhere, it must hold India accountable for caste violence. Dalit rights are not an internal matter of India; they are human rights. India seeks global recognition as a democracy, yet denies democracy to millions within. The hypocrisy must be exposed.”
Usman Askari says the lynching of Kishore Chamar must not fade into the background noise of statistics. His name must stand as a reminder that until India acts decisively, the chains of caste oppression will continue to bind millions. Breaking these chains requires more than token condemnations.
Ijaz says that India cannot claim the mantle of democracy while mobs enforce caste order with blood and fire. “Each act of caste violence erodes the foundations of its republic. Each lynching is a message to Dalits that their lives are disposable. The world must recognise this truth: India is not a democracy with caste terror. It is a fascist state where equality exists only on paper.”
The author works for The News, reporting on militancy and security issues. He can be contacted at sherali9984gmail.com