Australia’s National Anti-Racism Framework (NARF) recognises caste-based discrimination as a form of intersectional racial discrimination and the need for improving protections in anti-discrimination laws. To that effect, NARF in Recommendation 17 calls upon ‘The Australian Government [to] investigate options for legal protections against caste discrimination, including potential reform of existing legislation.’
A standalone recommendation on prohibiting caste discrimination in Australian law is a significant achievement and a step toward the ultimate goal of amending the Federal Racial Discrimination Act, 1975, to include caste discrimination as a ground for discrimination. This recognition was only due to the advocacy strategy led by SGRS and AIM within a short span of six months based on the report Caste in Australia: A Phenomenology of Casteism.
The commissioning of the community consultations — of which this report is an outcome — by FECCA and AHRC was to identify statuses of existing forms of racial discrimination and to locate emerging forms of racism in multicultural communities by relying on lived experiences of racialised communities in Australia, with the key aim of informing the development of the National Anti-Racism Framework.
Using this strong foundational base, Lead Researcher Asang Wankhede developed a multipronged legal advocacy strategy after submission of this report to FECCA in May 2024, on three pillars:
- Recognise the existence of caste discrimination in Australian society as a form of pervasive and systemic intersectional racism — not just an inter-personal diaspora community issue.
- Highlight the extent of casteism in Australia in all aspects of public and private life relying on empirical realities and data.
- Adopt a proactive human-rights approach to advocacy, identifying and engaging government and civil-society organisations and media representation to share the insights from the grassroots.