America’s tech giants are taking a modern-day crash course in India’s millennia-old caste system, with Apple emerging as an early leader in policies to rid Silicon Valley of a rigid hierarchy that has for generations segregated Indians.
Reuters reports that caste discrimination was outlawed in India over 70 years ago, yet according to several studies in recent years, bias persists.
Apple, the world’s biggest listed company, updated its general employee conduct policy about two years ago to explicitly prohibit discrimination on the basis of caste, which it added alongside existing categories such as race, religion, gender, age and ancestry.
The inclusion of the new category, which hasn’t been previously reported, goes beyond U.S. discrimination laws, which do not explicitly ban casteism.
Big Tech [is confronting] a millennia-old hierarchy where Indians’ social position has been based on family lineage, from the top Brahmin “priestly” class to the Dalits, shunned as “untouchables” and consigned to menial labor.
Apple’s main internal policy on workplace conduct, which was seen by Reuters, added reference to caste in the equal employment opportunity and anti-harassment sections after September 2020.
Apple confirmed that it “updated language a couple of years ago to reinforce that we prohibit discrimination or harassment based on caste.” It added that training provided to staff also explicitly mentions caste.
“Our teams assess our policies, training, processes and resources on an ongoing basis to ensure that they are comprehensive,” it said. “We have a diverse and global team, and are proud that our policies and actions reflect that.”
MacDailyNews Note: Reuters reports that several tech corporations do not specifically reference caste in their main global policy, including Google-owner Alphabet, Amazon, Dell, Facebook-owner Meta, and Microsoft.
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Just stop. These policies solve nothing.
They will ensure that in India when Apple hire local talent they will not have a Labour pool restricted by the Caste system.
People with broken legs or arms already feel bad enough. Just seems mean to give them any shit about it….
It may cause a split-er faction.