“…The value of a man was reduced to his immediate identity and nearest possibility. To a vote. To a number. To a thing. Never was a man treated as a mind. As a glorious thing made up of star dust. In every field, in studies, in streets, in politics, and in dying and living.”
– Dr Rohith Vemula
The Blue Dawn is a mental health collective created by and for people from caste-oppressed communities across religions including those from Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, Other Backward Classes, Nomadic Tribes, and Decriminalised Notified Tribes.
Since 2018, we have been working at the intersections of mental health, social justice, and the annihilation of caste, grounding our work in feminist and anti-caste methodologies. We understand that mental health cannot be separated from the structural realities of caste, class, gender, and ethnicity.
The Blue Dawn challenges the dominant, individualistic models of mental health that stem from colonial frameworks models that view people as isolated beings, detached from their communities and lived experiences. Instead, we advocate for community-based, relational approaches to care that recognise how systems of oppression shape our emotional and psychological lives.
We facilitate affordable, caste-aware mental health services designed specifically for people from caste and ethnic marginalities. Beyond therapy, we build spaces of rest, healing, and solidarity where care is not a privilege, but a collective act.
Over the past two years, The Blue Dawn has been at the forefront of bringing anti-caste mental health practices to India through narrative and anti-oppressive frameworks, drawing from the histories of racial justice movements while situating them in the South Asian society.
