01860nam a22001577a 4500999001900000008004100019100002700060245009700087260005200184300003600236520123800272773005201510906002201562942000701584952011101591 c525020d525020240207b ||||| |||| 00| 0 eng d aMahmood Sadia, 948410 aUntouchability, caste, and the electorate: Revisiting legacies of the Poona pact in Pakistan aThe Indian Economic and Social History Review  a60(4), Oct-Dec, 2023: p.451-476 aSoon after partition, Pakistan proposed separate electorates for religious minorities, including the Scheduled Castes (SC), with hopes of establishing an Islamic democracy. This article analyses the Pakistani state’s efforts to give distinct electorates to SC, which resulted in the retention of caste as a constitutional category, primarily among ‘Hindus’. It also looks on East Pakistani politicians' unwillingness to bridge political divides in the early years of Pakistan's history. By drawing on fresh archival sources, this exploration sheds insight on the shift/transformation in East Pakistan’s conceptualisation of the nation immediately following the partition. It argues that the colonial classifications of majority, minority, caste and SC were maintained by the post-colonial state for nation-building programmes and power politics. East Pakistani leaders, on the other hand, repudiated this continuity as they sought to oppose West Pakistan's political dominance. This article also demonstrates that there is a historical discontinuity between the post-partition and the contemporary politics of the Scheduled Castes in Pakistan. – Reproduced https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/00194646231201112  aThe Indian Economic and Social History Review  aINDIA – HISTORY cAR 00102ddc40709400066aIIPAbIIPAd2024-02-07h60(4), Oct-Dec, 2023: p.451-476pAR130852r2024-02-07yAR