California Committee passes landmark bill to prohibit caste discrimination
equality and social justice, the Assembly Judiciary Committee of California recently conducted a hearing for Senate Bill 403 (SB403), which aims to prohibit caste discrimination, according to a report published by ABC10. If passed, California would become the first state in the United States to explicitly ban caste-based discrimination by including caste as a protected category under the state's Unruh Civil Rights Act, as well as fair housing and employment laws. The bill has been passed by the Assembly Judiciary Committee, and now it will move to the Appropriations Committee.
If the Appropriations Committee also passes the bill, it will then head to the Assembly floor for a full vote, ABC10 reported. According to the Public Policy Institute of California, Asian Americans make up 15% of the population in the US state and around one million people living in California identify themselves as South Asian including Indian, Pakistani, Nepalese, Sri Lankan, Bangladeshi, and Bhutanese. California State Senator Aisha Wahab, the first Muslim and Afghan American elected to the state legislature, also introduced the bill in March this year seeking to explicitly ban caste discrimination.
Meanwhile, the landmark law banning caste-based discrimination came into effect in the US city of Seattle, making it the first city outside India to enforce such a legislation. Seattle was not only the first American city to ban caste discrimination but was the first jurisdiction at any level globally outside South Asia to do so.
Many Indian Americans fear that codifying caste in public policy will further fuel instances of Hinduphobia in the US. Over the last three years, ten Hindu temples and five statues, including those of Mahatma Gandhi and
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