As a child the Rev. Busi Suneel Bhanu had no inkling of his status in the Indian caste system. Enlightenment came in his early teens, when a teacher voiced shock on being told that Suneel was "Dalit," the name used for those Indians regarded as "untouchable" because of the traditional nature of their occupations. "He said, 'How can a boy as clever as you be one of those?' "

Questioning his mother, Busi learned that he was one of those 15 percent of Indians destined to remain at the bottom of the social heap unless very lucky. "Suddenly so many things made sense. Visiting my father's village, I always wondered why when we reached the upper-caste area, we had to lay down our bikes and walk the rest of the way."

On a three-year sabbatical from Gurukul Lutheran Theological College and Research Institute (the first seminary in India to promote research on Dalit theology) in Madras, where he is an associate professor in the Department of Religion and Culture, Busi is in Japan to conduct studies into Japan's own caste system. After only six months, he feels ill-qualified to talk on the subject of "burakumin," but then most people know nothing. Reactions among Japanese have been illuminating: "They're ignorant, indifferent or embarrassed."