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Two days after Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge addressed a public rally at Haldwani’s Ramlila Maidan in Uttarakhand on August 8, a shuddhikaran havan (purification ritual) was conducted at the same venue. Members of the Shri Ram Sena Dharmarth Seva Nyas Sangathan performed the ritual to purify the site. The organisation cited the slogans raised at the rally and Kharge’s criticism of the BJP and the RSS as its justification for the ceremony.

But a political disagreement does not make a public space impure and it certainly does not justify cleansing a venue after it has been used by a person from the Dalit community. The act reproduced the caste logic of purity and pollution that lies at the heart of untouchability. Kharge subsequently raised the matter in the Rajya Sabha, calling it an experience of untouchability and humiliation, and sought action under the law.

The incident should be called what it is: an expression of caste-based untouchability. The fact that the organisers offered a political justification does not erase the social meaning of the act. In a society where the Dalit community has historically been subjected to exclusion on that basis, such a ritual reproduces an idea that should have no place in a democratic society.

Political disagreement can be answered with argument, protest or criticism. It cannot justify treating a space as impure because of who occupied it.

The politics of purification

Purification is never simply about cleanliness. It establishes a boundary between what is considered “pure” and “impure.” In the caste order, this distinction has historically been imposed upon human beings themselves. Certain communities have been treated as closer to ritual purity, while others have been placed at the bottom of the hierarchy and treated as “polluting.” Their touch, presence and proximity have been regulated accordingly.

The Haldwani incident brings this logic into the contemporary public space. The symbolism of a venue being “purified” after being occupied by a person belonging to the Dalit community is unmistakable: something associated with the event was deemed as requiring “cleansing.”

Such a ritual reproduces the very social imagination that sustains untouchability and this is why the incident deserves criticism not merely as an act of political provocation, but as an act that reproduces caste hierarchy. It is not necessary for the organisers to explicitly announce that Kharge’s caste was the reason for the purification, for the casteist meaning of the act........

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