Intersecting Oppressions: The Lived Realities of Dom Women in Banaras, India

Abstract

This research presents a theory-driven, qualitative account of how caste and gender work together to shape structural oppression in the lives of Dom women in Banaras (Varanasi), India. Based on fifteen in-depth interviews and approximately eighty hours of participant observation in the cremation settlements adjacent to the Manikarnika and Harishchandra Ghats, the research adopts an intersectional lens rooted in feminist standpoint epistemology. Inductive coding of verbatim transcripts identifies three mutually reinforcing mechanisms—affective discipline (gendered coercion through gratitude and fear), spatial stigma (postal-code proxies for ritual pollution), and metabolic inequality (unequal exposure to toxic ash, bleach, and smoke) — that lock Dom women into hazardous, low-wage niches of the informal economy. Compared with both upper-caste women and Dom men, participants experience significantly higher rates of occupational injury, wage theft and everyday humiliation, confirming that caste-gender oppression is not additive but synergistic. The findings refine intersectionality theory by specifying how “purity” logics operate as a caste-gender gearbox in a South-Asian urban context. By foregrounding the voices of one of India’s most marginalised constituencies, the study demonstrates why adequate social protection must address caste and gender simultaneously, rather than in parallel. © 2025 Singh et al. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.