A national rally in New Delhi on March 12 urged political parties to include in their election manifestos the reservation for Dalit Christians and Muslims.

“We have to see that our rights are rightly accepted. We should not lose our fight,” said Archbishop George Antony-samy of Madras Mylapore while address-ing the rally.

The National Council of Dalit Christians (NCDC) organized the rally with support from the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India and the National Council of Churches in India.

The rally started at 10 am from Janpath ended at Jantar Mantar, both close to the Indian parliament building.

Besides Archbishop Antonysamy, three bishops from Tamil Nadu joined the rally. Monsignor Susai Sebastian, vicar general of the Archdiocese of Delhi, and Danam, a retired civil service officer and NCDC president led the rally. Dhanam said the main purpose of the rally was to demand from the government Scheduled Caste status for Christians and Muslims of Dalit origin. These groups are as socially, economically, and politically weak as their counterparts in Hindu, Buddhist and Muslim religions. Yet they are discriminated on the basis of religion, Dhanam regretted..

The rally demanded deletion of paragraph 3 of the Constitution Scheduled Caste Order 1950 that made reservation on the basis of religion.

Dalit Christians and Muslims have appealed to national and regional political parties to include in their election manifesto a promise to grant the Scheduled Caste Status to them.