Christianity changing lives of India's 'untouchables'

(July 13, 2012) A human rights group in India says Christianity has brought slow but lasting change to the country's Dalits or former “untouchables,” especially for the community's women who are often victims of prostitution and human trafficking. “The Dalits are told that they are less than animals and we tell them they are not because they are made in the likeness of God,” said Jeevaline Kumar of the non-profit international Christian NGO, Operation Mobilisation. Kumar, who is the director of the NGO’s Anti-Human Trafficking Project in Bangalore, explained that the simple message that every person is created in God's image has transformed the lives of India's Dalits. “They are crying out for a change now that they know they can live differently,” she said. Numbering some 250 million, Dalits make up close to one quarter of India’s 1.2 billion population but the notoriously ingrained caste system looks down upon them as inherently impure and worthless. Kumar complained that although the caste system was officially outlawed in 1950, law enforcement is still lacking. Kumar pointed out that it is the Dalit women who are victimized most, saying many of them are forced into prostitution, to clean human waste or are forced to abort if their unborn child is a female.