The Dalits and Tsunami Response.

"Shunned, India's Untouchables Gather Tsunami Dead"

NAGAPATTINAM, India - They are the "untouchables"; the lowest of the low in India's ancient caste system. No job is too dirty or too nasty, and they are the ones cleaning up the rotting corpses from last week's killer tsunami.
   The overwhelming majority of the 1,000 or so men sweating away in the tropical heat to clear the poor south Indian fishing town of Nagapattinam, which bore the brunt of the giant wave, are lower caste dalits from neighboring villages.
   Locals too afraid of disease and too sickened by the smell refuse to join the grim task of digging friends and neighbors out of the sand and debris. They just stand and watch the dalits work.
   Although it has been a week since the tsunami hit, and the destruction was confined to a tiny strip by the beach and port, the devastation was so fierce that several bodies -- located by the stench and the flies -- are still being discovered daily.
   "I am only doing what I would do for my own wife and child," says M. Mohan, a dalit municipal cleaner as he takes a break to wash off some of the grime of the day's work.
   "It is our duty. If a dog is dead, or a person, we have to clean it up."
   Mohan and other sanitation workers from neighboring municipalities are working around the clock to clear Nagapattinam, for an extra 50 cents a day and a meal.
   The smell of death still hangs heavily, mixing with the sea breeze and the almost refreshingly tart smell of the antiseptic lime powder that has turned some streets and paths white.
   More than 5,525 people -- close to 40 percent of India's estimated total 14,488 fatalities -- died along this small stretch of pure white beach, where the huts of poor fishermen were built down to the sand at the top of the beach itself. [Continues]