http://www.indian-express.com/ie/daily/20001231/ifr31039.html

PANCHGANI, DECEMBER 30: A Dalit leader from Andhra Pradesh, Kancha Illaiah, in a strong presentation at the National Conference on Human Rights here today said that Dalits all across the country were strongly opposed to Sanskrit.

``We want to kill Sanskrit in this country,'' he said and added that if Dalits have to learn Sanskrit to become priests in temples, they would rather not become priests.

He said that the Dalits were more for teaching all Indian childrenEnglish and that he could identify with the language lot better than he didwith Sanskrit, the language ``which does not let me identify with Goddirectly.''

Illaiah was speaking on Dalit Rights at a plenary session and wasspeaking to a wide audience. Apart from taking constant digs at politiciansand Brahminism he propogated that the complete consciousness of thecountry needs to be ``Daliticised''. Only that would be source to India'sprogress, according to him. Symbolising politicians as cows, foreignersas horses he called his own Dalit community buffaloes. He rationalisedthat if the Hindus termed Christians and Muslims as foreigners, Hindustoo were foreigners since they were from Aryan origin.

In a fiery speech, Illaiah ascertained that Dalits were in fact moreconcerned about the development of the country than the so-called Brahminsin the Indian government were. He took frequent digs at the SanghParivar and its Opposition to married couples going on honeymoons as well aspeople cutting cakes on their birthdays. ``The RSS is coming to yourdoorstep like the German tourism,'' he ridiculed referring to the organisations nation-wide awareness programme