Introduction
‘The term 'Dalit' meaning, 'oppressed' in the Sanskrit language, and 'broken' in Hindi/Urdu, is a 'defiant' self-chosen political name for the members of lower castes in India. (Madan, 2017). The deprivation of this group is associated with the historical processes of economic and social exclusion and discrimination based on the caste’. (Thorat, 2009, p1). ‘Tribal groups or Adivasis is commonly translated as 'indigenous people' or 'original inhabitants', and means' Adi or earliest time', and 'vasi or resident of'. (Das and Mehta, U/K). Regardless of the social categories, they fall into; these two communities were and are segregated socially and ritually from the mainstream and upper caste groups.
Dalits and Adivasis, considered as the 'lowest' in India, often termed as Scheduled caste and Scheduled tribe, are underrepresented in any forms of visual media. The stories or photographs of violations on Dalits and Adivasis are never radiated on front pages and also read from 'safe' distances. Examining the caste structure of India, Brahmins (priests) occupy the highest position, then followed by Kasthriyas (warriors/rulers), Vaishyas (merchants/landowners), Sudras (labourers) and Dalits. Even though there are numerous laws passed by the constitution of India for the welfare of Dalit and Adivasi communities, they still encounter discrimination and unfair treatment in Modern India, which are often hidden in the visual media.
‘As cameras arrived in port cities from Europe in the late 1840s, photo studios began spreading throughout the country’, (Holland, 2019), which was one of the greatest inventions of the era. However, it was also utilised by colonial elites as a part of their colonial propaganda. ‘The earliest ethnographic photography of India, dating from the 1860s and 1870s, emerged in the heyday of physiognomic interest in Indian body types and the early phases of the British conception of caste and Indian social structure’. (Francisco, 2003).
For British ethnographers of India, social classification according to "caste" became an obsession, providing the hard-cultural knowledge that would justify the colonial presence on the grounds of cultural and congenital European supremacy. (Francisco, 2003).
One of the prime examples of this is work by Edgar Thurston, 'Caste and tribes of Southern India. 'Photography is a key witness to the problematic colonial explorations of race, nationality and identity’. (Jain,2019). The long-term impact of this Colonial photographic classification system on Indian society is evident in contemporary documentary photography emphasising Dalit and Adivasi communities.
By analysing works about caste and tribe from colonial India, and the post-colonial studies, this article demonstrates how colonial photographs influences modern India's approach towards the 'lowest'. The areas of key research are colonial, post-colonial, and contemporary photography, by studying works of Edgar Thurston, Edward.T. Dalton, Herbert Hope Resley, William Crooke, Sunil Janah, Sudharak Olwe, Gavin Evans, Gauri Gill and Johann Rousselot. This paper covers theories of Christopher Pinney, Elizabeth Edwards, Jason Fransico, Christoph von Fürer-Haimendorf, Michel Foucault, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Kamlesh Mohan and M.N Sreenivas.
The first chapter explores the Colonial works produced on Dalit and Adivasis by colonial administrators turned Ethnographers Edgar Thurston, Herbert Hope Risley and Edward T. Dalton, William Crooke, followed by a brief history of how photography as a medium was used during the British raj as colonial propaganda. By studying Christopher Pinney's Camera Indica, Rashmi Varma's Political Aesthetics, Jason Fransico's Of Cheroots and Current Coins: Reconsidering the Photography of Colonial India, Kamlesh Mohan's Proceedings of the Indian History Congress, Chapter one explores the colonial ethnographical studies on India's Dalit's and Adivasis.
By examining post-colonial works by Sunil Janah and Christoph von Fürer-Haimendorf, and the impact of ethnographic studies on the Indian culture after the Independence, chapter two investigate and uncovers the rationale of the invisibility of the marginalised communities in visual media. The primary area of research in chapter two are theories by Gayatri Chakravarthy Spivak on the study of Subalterns, imperialism and colonial discourse, Christophers Pinney, Rashmi Varma and Michel Foucault. The theories provide an insight into the relationship between power and knowledge; also, the chapter briefly explains the constitutional rights granted to the marginalised communities and its failure to execute it successfully.
Chapter three studies contemporary documentary photographic work produced by Sudharak Olwe, Gavin Ewans, Gauri Gill and Johann Rousselot on the stories of oppression, resilience and courage of the Dalit and Adivasi communities in modern India. By evaluating the findings, chapter three uncovers how contemporary photographic works are working as a medium to communicate the 'oppressed' reality of these communities to the rest of the world. Furthermore, the reason for their invisibility is also reviewed.