Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Recruitment & retention
    • Wellbeing
    • Occupational Health
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise

Personnel Today

Register
Log in
Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Recruitment & retention
    • Wellbeing
    • Occupational Health
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise

Bullying and harassmentEmployment lawEquality, diversity and inclusionRace discriminationReligious discrimination

Caste conflict: legal dilemma

by Personnel Today 10 Jul 2009
by Personnel Today 10 Jul 2009

I own a small business, employing eight people. One of my employees, a Hindu, is refusing to work with her new line manager because she is a Dalit or, as she says, a ‘lower caste’. Our business is small so there is no scope to relocate or separate them. What do I do?

‘Dalit’ is a term for a group of people traditionally regarded as of low caste and was historically made up of numerous caste groups all over South Asia speaking various languages.

The caste system itself is a social phenomenon and has no genetic basis, and was formally abolished under the Indian constitution in 1976. Many commentators and organisations feel that the caste system has been imported into the UK labour market, and groups are campaigning for caste to be specifically covered in the Equality Bill.

The Bill is currently working its way through Parliament and aims to consolidate nine existing equality laws into a single law that will tackle disadvantage and discrimination based on race, gender, disability, age, sexual orientation, religion or belief, but it does not expressly deal with caste discrimination at present.

Turning to your problem, caste discrimination is not specifically recognised in existing UK legislation and, because of its fluid nature, it does not naturally fall into the camps of race or religious discrimination. For instance, many Dalits follow the Hindu faith. However, individual aspects of caste may well be caught by discrimination legislation.

On a practical level, you should encourage dialogue between the individuals to see whether the matter can be resolved informally. If this does not work, it may be that the problem is suited to mediation by a third party, and I would refer you to the new Acas Guide on Discipline and Grievances on this point.

You should certainly take advice throughout the process as the issues involved here are potentially complex as you are balancing the competing rights of two workers. If you reach a position whereby the Hindu employee simply refuses to work with the Dalit employee, you may be faced with having to make a decision in relation to the Hindu employee’s continued employment.

Without wishing to over simplify the issue, the question to ask yourself is whether you would treat a non-Hindu worker in the same manner as this Hindu worker if they were refusing to work with a colleague due to their perceived ‘status’ or their race or religion?

Sign up to our weekly round-up of HR news and guidance

Receive the Personnel Today Direct e-newsletter every Wednesday

OptOut
This field is for validation purposes and should be left unchanged.

If the answer is yes, you should be in a position to defend a claim on the basis that the dismissal was substantially fair and was not less favourable treatment or tainted by discrimination on the basis of race and/or religious belief.

Emma Harvey, partner, DWF

Personnel Today

Personnel Today articles are written by an expert team of award-winning journalists who have been covering HR and L&D for many years. Some of our content is attributed to "Personnel Today" for a number of reasons, including: when numerous authors are associated with writing or editing a piece; or when the author is unknown (particularly for older articles).

previous post
Swine flu – top tips for employers
next post
HR news today: Gender pay gap lives on; Disabled man awarded £78,000 at tribunal; Acas bid to avert Aberdeen transport strike; Carlisle council to sack staff over pay cut agreement

You may also like

Lidl enters agreement with EHRC to prevent sexual...

22 Aug 2025

X settles severance claims of former Twitter employees

22 Aug 2025

Council defends suggested alternatives to ‘husband’ and ‘wife’

21 Aug 2025

Midwife files belief claim after Trust reported social...

20 Aug 2025

‘Noisy and boisterous’ younger colleagues not age-related harassment

20 Aug 2025

Personnel Today Awards 2025 shortlist: Employment Law Firm...

20 Aug 2025

Could equal pay questionnaires be revived?

19 Aug 2025

British Transport Police first force to hire part-time...

19 Aug 2025

Eurostar’s Georgie Willis a keynote speaker at Employee...

19 Aug 2025

Worker awarded £3,000 for ‘Slave’ graffiti employer had...

7 Aug 2025

  • Elevate your L&D strategy at the World of Learning 2025 SPONSORED | This October...Read more
  • How to employ a global workforce from the UK (webinar) WEBINAR | With an unpredictable...Read more

Personnel Today Jobs
 

Search Jobs

PERSONNEL TODAY

About us
Contact us
Browse all HR topics
Email newsletters
Content feeds
Cookies policy
Privacy policy
Terms and conditions

JOBS

Personnel Today Jobs
Post a job
Why advertise with us?

EVENTS & PRODUCTS

The Personnel Today Awards
The RAD Awards
Employee Benefits
Forum for Expatriate Management
Whatmedia

ADVERTISING & PR

Advertising opportunities
Features list 2025

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Linkedin


© 2011 - 2025 DVV Media International Ltd

Personnel Today
  • Home
    • All PT content
  • Email sign-up
  • Topics
    • HR Practice
    • Employee relations
    • Learning & training
    • Pay & benefits
    • Recruitment & retention
    • Wellbeing
    • Occupational Health
    • HR strategy
    • HR Tech
    • The HR profession
    • Global
    • All HR topics
  • Legal
    • Case law
    • Commentary
    • Flexible working
    • Legal timetable
    • Maternity & paternity
    • Shared parental leave
    • Redundancy
    • TUPE
    • Disciplinary and grievances
    • Employer’s guides
  • AWARDS
    • Personnel Today Awards
    • The RAD Awards
  • Jobs
    • Find a job
    • Jobs by email
    • Careers advice
    • Post a job
  • Brightmine
    • Learn more
    • Products
    • Free trial
    • Request a quote
  • Webinars
  • Advertise