Caste system.

New Delhi -- The Catholic Church in India has been unable to wipe out caste-based discrimination against Dalit Catholics, a senior bishop has acknowledged. Dalits include both lower caste as well as casteless "untouchables" and adivasi, or "tribal" Indians who are outside the Hindu system. Dalit means "trampled upon."

Dalits put up with widespread discrimination by upper castes, often live in segregated communities and usually carry out menial jobs for the upper castes on whom the landless Dalits rely for their survival.

"Dalits embraced Christianity with the hope of finding acceptance, equality with others, and human dignity. But the upper-caste Christians did not accept them as their equals. Instead they are subjected to the same indignity and humiliation which they suffered before they embraced Christianity," said Bishop Malayappan Chinnappa of Vellore in Tamil Nadu, a Dalit who heads the Catholic Bishops Conference of India Commission for Dalits.

Describing the caste system as a "diabolic form of terrorism," Bishop Chinnappa said that the Church had not yet made "concerted efforts" to stamp out discrimination.