ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the different aspects of Dalit conversion and the different reasons that have led them to it through political, autobiographical and fictional representations. These representations also reflect Dalit affiliations with cultural history alongside the graph of their aesthetic formulations as they move out of their personal histories towards more experimental, non-linear, historical narratives. Conversion has a long history in most cultures; however, in contemporary India, right from the beginning of the twentieth century, the conversion of the Dalits has been embroiled in political issues. In the case of the Dalits, conversion is a search for identity, social acceptance, human dignity and equality; it is also a struggle for political representation. Through the act of conversion, the Dalits seek a faith which can accommodate Dalit experience. Dalit writing expresses both a conscious and an unconscious need to reclaim their myths, histories and culture, to record the lost experiences that have sustained them and to bring out their vitality.
