Activists push tech on caste bias after Cisco suit
A group of scholars and activists sent a letter to 25 large tech companies Wednesday, demanding action to address caste discrimination in the workplace following a lawsuit filed against Cisco.
Caste is a regimented hierarchy rooted in India’s Hindu society but is present throughout South Asia, and is often found in the region’s overseas diasporas. A person’s caste can determine where they go to school, where they work, what kind of jobs they have and their marriage partner. In India, caste identity can also lead to lynchings and other violence against people who are deemed “lower” caste.
Ajantha Subramanian, a professor at Harvard University, wrote in the letter: “The prevalence of caste discrimination in both elite technical education and private industry in India makes its entry into the American workplace not the least bit
surprising.” The group is part of the Indian American Alliance Against Caste.
The letter was sent to companies including Apple, Google, Facebook and Cisco after a state agency sued Cisco in federal court in June on behalf of an unnamed Indian employee, alleging discrimination based on his Dalit (lower and oppressed) caste status.
The California Department of Fair Employment and Housing’s lawsuit could be groundbreaking by specifying caste as a form of discrimination. U.S. law does not define caste as a discriminatory practice but, the state’s lawsuit alleges Cisco violated the man’s rights under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibits discrimination based on a person’s race, religion, national origin and sex. It also cited the California’s Fair Employment and Housing Act, alleging his managers, who are from dominant castes, harassed, discriminated and retaliated against him because of his status.
Cisco, headquartered in San Jose, has denied the allegation and said it has created an inclusive and fair workplace. Since the Cisco lawsuit was filed, more than 250 Dalits in Silicon Valley have come forward with caste discrimination complaints, according to Vice.
Other local firms that received the letter included Nvidia, Cognizant,
Netflix, Hewlett Packard, Qualcomm and Oracle. The companies did not immediately respond to an emailed request for comment.
“Caste based discrimination has long been an unacknowledged problem in Silicon Valley and the US. The Cisco case names it and asks all of us to take it seriously,” the letter states. “Neglecting caste is tantamount to allowing your company to be a hostile workplace,” it read.
The letter demands that CEOs intervene immediately to address the issue and enact policies to combat castebased discrimination alongside similar policies on race, gender and sexuality in their firms, and to include training on caste discrimination, and review recruitment policies to eliminate that bias.
During a news conference Wednesday, Kevin Brown, a law professor at Indiana University, said the lawsuit had the potential to affect significant social and political change around the issue of caste in American life.
“American society has not generally enacted laws that outlaw caste discrimination” Brown said, noting that advocates for the abolition of slavery in the U.S. had historically referred to that system as relying on caste.
“There is in this country no superior or dominant class of citizens,” Brown said, noting that if there was a fundamental principle of American law it is that a person cannot be discriminated against because of characteristics they cannot control.