BHUBANESWAR: Upping the ante against the Government over continuance of Keuta, Kaibartya and Dhibar in the Scheduled Caste list despite a Supreme Court ruling for their exclusion, Dalits under the Asprusya Dalit Sanrakshyana Surakshya Samiti (ADSSS) staged a massive rally in the City to press for expeditious steps on the issue.
Thousands of Dalits led by Samiti president Bhojraj Loha and secretary Mihir Sethi converged at the PMG Square and submitted a memorandum to the Chief Minister calling for immediate deletion of these castes from the SC list as they did not fulfil the basic parameters of untouchability.
The three communities had obtained SC status by adopting unfair means and had cornered major chunk of the benefits while the genuine beneficiaries were still languishing.
They claimed to be similar to the Dewar caste of Chhattisgarh.
Also the Dewar caste is non-existent in Orissa.
Supreme Court by its 1996 order has ruled against their continuance as SCs and even the Union Social Welfare Ministry in two phases in December 2007 and May 2008 has recommended exclusion of these communities from the SC list.
Acting on these, the Orissa Government should press the Centre to bring a bill in Parliament to rectify the anomalies, the Samiti has demanded.