Impact of Globalisation on Marginalised Group and Role of Social Movement

Impact of Globalisation on Marginalised Group and Role of Social Movement
( A Study of Dhankut of District Bahraich, U.P.)

Dr. Alok Chantia* & Dr. Preeti Misra**
*Lecturer, Dept. of Anthropology, Sri J.N.P.G. College, Lucknow; E-Mail alokchantia@rediffmail.com
** Lecturer, Dept of Human Rights, School for Legal Studies, Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar University, Lucknow; E-Mail misra9us@gmail.com

Keywords: Globalisation, Marginalised Group, Social Movement, Dhankut
Abstract: The theory of psychic unity of mind accelerates the process of globalization and social development, but resources, carrying capacity and limitation of an individual or group create many constraints before marginalized people to access the fruits of globalization and social development. Hence society ultimately faces the event of social movement. All these phenomenon can be visualized in a marginalized group Dhankut of District Bahraich of Uttar Pradesh.Their living place is known as Dhankuttypura. They have a small population of 2687 people (2001 census). Cross cousin marriage, parallel cousin marriage are their queer cultural characters which make them different from other cultural groups of Bahraich. No literature is available about them even in District gazetteer. Existence of traditional Panchayat, cross cousin marriage etc qualify them for tribal status, but even today they have not been recognized so by the government. It is a non agricultural group, engaged in traditional work of cereal selling. After 1980 with the advent of globalisation their traditional work suffereded and they adopted other small time occupations as means of survival. Even though Dhankut are living in the middle of the city but they are devoid of basic facilities of education, electricity, water supply, sanitary system etc due to poor economic conditions.
Though Dhankut of District Bahraich are marginalized people but they are far away from all those government benefits which are otherwise available to marginalized groups such as SC/ST/OBC. Government / private jobs are a distant dream for them. Illiteracy and poverty has ruined their lives. Impotency, skin diseases, albinism are their main health problems. Though Civil Court is near to their living place but due to poverty they stick to their traditional Panchayat for dispute resolution. Their Children are also engaged in small time work to earn livelihood. In order to bring change in their living conditions they have started fighting for ward election after the declaration of Dhankuttypura as wardDue to Globalisation and negligent attitude of the government Dhankut have lagged behind in social development and are becoming more and more marginalized. Recently they have formed a ‘Dhankut Sangharsh Samiti’ to fight for their identity, status and development. A case is also pending in SC/ST Commission, U.P., Lucknow for claiming their status in society.
Present paper attempts to analyse whether globalization is ruining cultural identities? Whether social development depend upon the economy of a group? Whether globalization has negative effect on marginalized people? Whether marginalized people are able to lead any social movement to overcome exploitation and better their position? Whether fruits of globalization and social development have reached to only small segment of the society? All these questions have been analysed in the light of study on the group Dhankut of district Bahraich, U.P.