Newsroom
Statements AKSC has issued on caste discrimination, legislation, litigation, and solidarity with other movements.
17 statements
February 22, 2026
AKSC condemns Pattimandram Raja and the Greater Atlanta Tamil Sangam after a Tamil woman's caste was scrutinised on the sidelines of a GATS event in Atlanta, Georgia.
July 22, 2025
The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California upheld the California Civil Rights Department's authority to act against caste oppression, and rejected the Hindu American Foundation's claim to speak for all Hindu Americans.
March 17, 2025
A federal court rejected the argument that including caste in California State University's anti-discrimination policy violates religious practice, leaving the protection in place for students and staff.
January 16, 2025
Rutgers commits to addressing caste in university policy, to training employment equity specialists, and to putting caste questions into regular campus surveys.
December 2, 2024
The California Civil Rights Department won access to Cisco's internal communications mentioning caste, a milestone in the discrimination lawsuit first filed in the summer of 2020.
August 19, 2024
A federal court dismissed the Hindu American Foundation's suit against the California Civil Rights Department, having already called its religious freedom argument highly speculative and implausible.
September 6, 2023
Teachers, students and researchers, convened by the America Against Caste Discrimination alliance of over 20 organisations, urge Governor Newsom to sign SB 403 into law.
September 6, 2023
AKSC writes to Governor Newsom urging him to sign SB 403, which strengthens protection against caste discrimination in housing, employment and education.
August 28, 2023
AKSC welcomes the 50-3 Assembly vote adding caste as a protected category under ancestry, delivered sixty years to the day after Martin Luther King Jr. shared his dream.
July 10, 2023
After a unanimous committee vote, AKSC argues that had SB 403 existed before the 2020 Cisco case, the complainant would not have been told that caste discrimination is not unlawful.
April 30, 2021
A Santa Clara County Human Rights Commission hearing on making caste a protected category filled its 500-person limit and ran seven and a half hours past 1:00 am.
April 15, 2021
The Alphabet Workers Union issued its statement on caste discrimination on the eve of Babasaheb Dr. Ambedkar's 130th birthday. AKSC welcomes a union taking up the oppressed caste part of the working class.
October 18, 2020
Ambedkarite and progressive Indian-American organisations back Proposition 16 to restore affirmative action in California, tracing the measure back to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act.
August 12, 2020
The Indian American Alliance Against Caste wrote to the CEOs of 25 US high-tech companies. Testimonials collected by the coalition point to widespread caste discrimination across the USA.
June 23, 2020
AKSC condemns the harassment of Divya Bharathi, director of the manual scavenging documentary Kakkoos, over the phone and on social media.
June 23, 2020
AKSC supports ACA-5, which would repeal Proposition 209 and let California consider race, sex and ethnicity again in public employment, contracting and education.
June 3, 2020
AKSC condemns the killing of George Floyd as a manifestation of institutional racism rather than one officer's isolated act, and stands with those demanding justice on the streets.