Women Heroes and Dalit Assertion in North India

Culture, Identity and Politics

This is the fifth volume in the series Cultural Subordination and the Dalit Challenge and explores cultural repression in India and ways in which it is overcome. The author shows how Dalit women heroes (viranganas) of the 1857 Rebellion have emerged as symbols of Dalit assertion in Uttar Pradesh and are being used by the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) to build the image of its leader, Mayawati.

While demonstrating how myths and memories of the role of Dalits in India's freedom struggle are employed for identity construction and reconstructed for political mobilization, this book

• Narrates some of the tales used to develop political consciousness at the grass-roots level
• Reveals how stories—picked up from among the people themselves—are reinterpreted, packaged, and disseminated orally and via pamphlets
• Describes how gods, heroes, and other cultural resources of each caste are converted into political capital by giving them a visual image through calendars, statues, posters, and memorials
• Shows how the BSP creates and recreates historical material to expand its electoral base

Based on field studies and secondary information, the author outlines the politics of dissent which uses historical and cultural resources as identity markers in political mobilization. This book, therefore, becomes invaluable for students of politics, sociology and history and all those engaged in Dalit studies.