Untouchable in the Land of Equality

Rahil Patel is a Speaker and Tutor at OCCA The Oxford Centre for Christian Apologetics

 

“When caste injustice crosses borders, what kind of story still sets people free?” 

A familiar story, far from home

Cisco is one of Silicon Valley’s most admired companies. With an annual revenue of $57 billion and a top ranking on Great Place to Work’s 2023 list, it projects an image of global success and progressive values. But beneath the accolades, something older and more troubling has surfaced.  

In 2020, the California Civil Rights Department filed a lawsuit against Cisco Systems, Inc., alleging caste-based discrimination against a Dalit (formerly “Untouchable”) engineer. While the case against the individual managers was dismissed in 2023, the broader case against the company itself continues.  

It’s not an isolated moment. Google’s CEO, Sundar Pichai—a high-caste Brahmin of Indian origin—has faced similar scrutiny. According to Equality Labs, caste bigotry is “running rampant” in the American tech industry. The patterns aren’t just residual—they’re active, spreading quietly across oceans and embedding themselves in unexpected places.  

Growing up in the UK, I often heard the weary saying: “You can take an Indian out of India, but you can never take India out of an Indian.” It usually surfaced when friends or relatives saw caste-based behaviour playing out in Western contexts. They were confused—but not surprised.  

In October 2023, California’s governor vetoed a bill that would have banned caste discrimination statewide. The decision provoked strong responses—particularly from Dalit voices and their allies who are pressing for recognition and justice. It might seem unthinkable that caste should be a live issue in Western democracies. But here we are.  

In 2021, the FBI raided the Robbinsville, New Jersey temple compound of the Swaminarayan movement—America’s largest and most powerful Hindu institution. What they found stunned many: 200 trafficked workers, mainly Dalits or from tribal communities, allegedly confined within the temple grounds and paid below minimum wage.  

Caste has travelled well.  

The boy who wouldn’t come in

I remember one moment vividly from my years training to be a Hindu monk in India. I’d just finished a conversation with a friend in the temple compound when I saw a young boy waving from outside the gates. I waved back and invited him in. But he didn’t move.  

“I can’t,” he called. 
“Why not?” 
“I’m a Dalit. I can’t even touch you.” 

That sentence still catches in my chest. In that moment, all the philosophy, ritual, and order I had absorbed collapsed into something raw and human: a child convinced he was untouchable.  

I think of the woman in the Bible with the issue of blood. Considered impure, excluded from society, she dared to touch the hem of Jesus’ robe. And Jesus—rather than rebuking her—turned, healed her, and called her daughter. He didn’t just restore her health. He restored her place in the human family. Had that Dalit boy stepped into the temple that day, he would likely have been beaten by the guards. And had he touched me, I would have been required to bathe fully clothed and avoid contact with anyone—or even a book or a pot—until I was purified.  

Caste isn’t just a social structure. It’s a moral universe. And it runs deep.  

Bhimrao Ambedkar understood this. A Dalit himself, and one of India’s sharpest legal minds, he studied at the London School of Economics and later drafted the Indian Constitution. He knew firsthand how caste suffocates. But he also recognised something else: that the Western ideal of dignity had roots—not just in law, but in theology.  

As Ambedkar in London, a recent book by William Gould, Santosh Dass, and Christophe Jaffrelot explores, Ambedkar’s time in the UK profoundly shaped his thinking. He encountered ideas of equality and justice embedded in British institutions—ideas ultimately grounded in a Judeo-Christian view of the human person: that all are made in the image of God.  

He brought that vision back with him. And in framing India’s Constitution, he refused to base it on Hindu scripture. He knew it would preserve the very inequality he was trying to undo.  

Today, caste discrimination is illegal in India. But society tells another story. And increasingly, it tells that story abroad too.  

Even in the UK, caste has entered public conversation. Some politicians have called for its inclusion in anti-discrimination law. That such a conversation is happening at all says something about caste’s reach—and Ambedkar’s ongoing relevance.  

It also raises the question of what kind of moral vision we want to preserve.  

Duty before dignity

A few years ago, Prime Minister Narendra Modi marked National Human Rights Day in India with a curious remark. He said that Dharma must come before human rights. If everyone performs their Dharma—traditionally understood as duty or righteous conduct—then human rights will follow. It sounds noble, even reasonable. But beneath the surface lies a more troubling implication.  

Solzhenitsyn once warned the West about its obsession with rights divorced from responsibility. He urged a return to moral obligation. But Modi’s version is different. In traditional Hindu society, to perform one’s Dharma is often to remain within one’s caste—accepting one’s role, no matter how low. This idea plays out vividly in the Bhagavad Gita, one of Hinduism’s most revered scriptures. Krishna tells Arjuna to fight and kill his relatives—not because the act is universally right, but because it is his duty as a warrior. Dharma trumps conscience. Birth trumps moral freedom.  

By contrast, the biblical story begins not with duty, but with dignity. Human beings are made in the image of God—before they are assigned any role or order. This difference in origin leads to a different view of justice, freedom, and identity.  

A different beginning

That’s why, in 1793, William Wilberforce and Charles Grant raised the issue of caste in the British Parliament. That same year, William Carey entered India—illegally—against the East India Company’s wishes. The Company feared that Christian missionaries would disrupt the social order by proclaiming equality across caste lines. And they were right.  

It took 20 years of pressure before missionaries were legally allowed in. And when they came, they didn’t just preach. They built schools, hospitals, and communities open to all. They quietly taught a different creation story—one in which God creates people first, and societies second.  

That reordering still matters.  

What fascinates me today is how often, when Dalits leave India, caste begins to loosen its grip. The shame begins to unravel. The narrative changes. In cultures shaped—however imperfectly—by the Christian story, the logic of karma loses its hold.  

A Dalit engineer suing his superiors in California would be unthinkable in most parts of India. But in a context where dignity is assumed rather than earned, new possibilities emerge.  

Caste, of course, is not exclusive to Hinduism. In Sri Lanka and Myanmar, Buddhist communities have adopted caste-based structures. Even some Indian Christian churches haven’t escaped it. In certain regions, Dalit Christians must sit on the floor at the back—or stay outside altogether.  

As E.M. Forster once wrote, India is both a mystery and a muddle. But the gospel cuts through both. John Stott, in The Cross, wrote that Jesus’s greatest agony in Gethsemane wasn’t physical suffering, but the anticipation of becoming sin—of being defiled. In that act, God embraced the untouchable. That embrace is still offered today.  

The work begun by Carey, Wilberforce, Grant, Ambedkar—and countless unnamed reformers—is not finished. But its foundation remains sure: a story in which dignity is given, not earned. In which every person can be seen, named, and restored.  

The only question is whether we have the courage to keep telling it.  

We cover themes of Dharma, Karma and Caste in our Key Concepts of Hinduism course. Do take a look! 

Further Resources to Explore:

BOOK: Ambedkar in London (2003) – A rich reflection on how Ambedkar’s time in the UK shaped his vision for dignity, democracy and the legal fight against caste.

RADIO: BBC Analysis: Caste in Britain (2011) – A compelling Radio 4 episode examining how caste continues to shape social attitudes in the UK today.

ARTICLE: “India to Include Caste in National Census” (AP News, 2024) – An historic shift in India’s policy landscape, with wide-ranging implications for how caste is tracked and challenged.

ARTICLE: “Time to Outlaw Caste Discrimination -MP” (2025) – Caste discrimination discussed in British parliament.

ARTICLE: Santosh, A film too honest for India? (The Guardian, 2025) – British Indian film about caste injustice. Critically acclaimed in Europe, but blocked in india