Dates of conference: August 23-25, 2023                                                            Venue: ISEC, Bengaluru

Concept note

Indian State has recognised the problem of intergroup inequality in our society associated with group identity of caste, tribe, religion and gender. Eventually, the Constitution in 1950 recognized the problem arising out of group’s identity, and made social justice (social, economic and political), liberty, equality and fraternity as the founding principle of State governance. Article 14, Article 15 Article 16, Article 17 and Article 46 assure equality and obligations on state to initiate policies to address inequality on account of group’s identity.

To give effect to the provision of Constitution, the Indian Government enacted the laws and policies for social groups such as scheduled castes, scheduled tribes, nomadic and de-notified tribes, women and religious minorities.

Over a period of time, there has been considerable progress in the status of the social groups in indicators of human development or economic wellbeing, like per-capita income, poverty reduction, improved nutrition, education, housing and assets ownership, civil and political rights and discrimination.

However, despite the progress, intergroup inequalities still persists. Increasingly the issue of intergroup inequalities has come into sharp focus and acquired prominence in policy discourse. Besides SC/ST/OBC, other groups have begun to demand the group based policies. These groups include the middle castes such as Marathas, Patel, Jat and several other sub castes, women, the Dalit Christians, and Dalit Muslims and religious minority like Muslims including the low-income group. The policies are adopted with limited evidence and the zone of ignorance is too large, which give rise to debate .

Therefore, this Conference will discuss the issue of “Inter group Inequality” in some depth. This being the first systematic attempt to discuss the neglected theme of group inequality, it will discuss the following issues:

1. The magnitude and nature of group inequality,

2. Sources of persisting group inequality,

3. Consequences in term of unequal out comes and

4. Policies for minimizing group inequalities.

The invited papers and keynote addresses will bring rich theoretical and empirical evidence on persistence of group inequality. The discussion will be organized around following themes.

• Panel 1: Intergroup inequality in income and poverty and its determinants and related issues

• Panel 2: Intergroup inequality in education, health, and housing, its sources, consequences and policies, privatisation of social services and discriminatory access

• Panel 3: Issues Related to political Rights and Representation of Scheduled castes, Tribes, women and Religious Minorities

• Panel 4: Issues related to unequal access to civil rights, citizenship including caste and gender discrimination and social status

• Panel 5: Philosophical Traditions and History of movement for equality since ancient to present time

• Panel 6: Issues related to Law and Constitution and legal safeguards against caste and gender discrimination , ,limitations if legal safeguards

• Panel 7: Psychological issues related to caste, ethnicity and Gender discrimination, theoretical and empirical aspects

• Panel 8: Issue of group inequality and discrimination as reflected in Literature and Visual Arts

• Panel 9: Group Inequality and Role of Media : Print, television , social media and Films

Special Panel on Karnataka

The focus of the special panel on Karnataka will be on the status of scheduled castes, Tribes, minorities, and issues related to human development, that includes income, poverty, malnutrition, education, health, housing, civic amenities, and civil rights, including untouchability in rural and urban areas.

This Panel will

• Discuss the progress and present social and economic status of the scheduled castes, and review policies including special component plan, and analyse factors that influence the present status;

• The progress and present social and economic status of the scheduled tribes, nomadic and de-notified , and similar groups, review of policies including Tribal sub plan and minorities; and analyse factors that influence the present status;

• The progress and present social and economic status of minorities and analyze factors that influence the present status;

• Discuss issues relating to aspirational districts/ taluks;

• The issues related to poverty, malnutrition and health: In health sectors the papers will examine the intergroup inequality in malnutrition, morbidity, infant and child mortality, child health, anemia, women’s health, maternal mortality, life expectancy, social disparities in medical education, status of health institutions, like primary and community health centres; tertiary care hospitals in public and private sectors, and access to health services and suggest changes, if necessary; contractualisation of human resource in health (HRH). This session also assess the magnitude of inequalities in health outcomes and to explain the contribution of different factors to the overall inequality in Karnataka

• The issues related to participation in and obtaining benefits from Panchayat Raj Institutions.

Process for research papers selection and publication

1. The papers are to be based on critical analysis of the data.

2. Step-1: The author/s should submit an abstract of 500 words, indicating paper title, details of author (s), critical issues focused, methodology to be adopted, key findings based on their analysis and citations of relevant books/ papers. Please indicate the number and title of the sub-theme under which the abstract is submitted. Each submitted abstract will go through double-blind review process.

3. Step-2. The full length paper of about 8,000 words is to be submitted and this will undergo review process and plagiarism check.

4. Step-3. The selected papers will be presented by the authors during the seminar, which will be discussed by a set of expert discussants. Then authors will be requested to revise the papers based on the suggestions received in the conference and submit the revised version.

5. The revised papers will be published as a volume from a leading international publisher.

Timelines

• Submission of abstract of about 500 words: 5th December, 2022. Abstracts are to be sent to Prof D Rajasekhar, Director, ISEC at [email protected]
• Communication of selection of abstract for preparing full-length paper: 3rd January, 2023.
• Submission of full paper of about 8,000 words: 30th June, 2023.
• Communication of decision on the selection of papers for presentation in the seminar: 2nd July 2023.

Local Organising Committee