Lucknow, India — While we in the United States focus on the question of whether Barack Obama, a black man, will be elected president, halfway around the world in India a more startling event occurred last year. Kumari Mayawati, a woman from the lowest caste on the Hindu hierarchy, the Dalit "untouchables," was elected chief minister of the largest state in India, Uttar Pradesh.

Uttar Pradesh, with 160 million people, holds the largest bloc of seats in India's 543 member Parliament. Neither of the two major parties - the governing Congress Party or its main opponent, the Bharatiya Janata Party - is expected to win control in the up-coming national elections. Ms. Mayawati, who built a coalition that drew voters from all levels in the Hindu caste system, has emerged as a figure on the national scene who could become the first low-caste or Dalit prime minister of India.

Although caste discrimination is officially banned in India, the arena of politics has remained the last hold-out where each caste seeks to uphold and advance its own interests. Ms. Mayawati, 52 and unmarried, is a former school teacher and lawyer who entered politics full time. She drew from the Dalits,who represent 16 percent of the population , and attracted voters from all caste and class levels with her three-part agenda: an eight-lane highway, better policing and private investment to ease poverty. In a rare interview, she told two American journalists in June, "I prefer to be known as a leader for all the communities. In every community, there are poor and unemployed people." She added, "We cannot fight just as Dalits. I understand for centuries people have fought each other. It is not easy to bring them together. But we have done this in U.P." Uttar Pradesh, a large northern state that borders on Nepal is commonly known in India as U.P.

The traditional constituents of the Congress Party have been the Dalits, the privileged Brahmins and the Muslims. Leadership has usually come from the upper-caste Nehru-Gandhi dynasty and Rahul Gandhi went on a widely reported tour of the Uttar Pradesh countryside, eating and sleeping in low-caste homes. Ms. Mayawati, attacked his tour and accused him of purifying himself later with a "special soap".

She clearly has national ambitions and sees herself in a strong position when either national party seeks her support to form a ruling coalition.

"She is an original," said Ajoy Bose, author of a sympathetic biography published by Penguin Books India. "She obviously is going to play a major role in our lives." A less sanguine opinion came from Mrinal Pande, chief editor of the Hindi-language daily newspaper, Hindustan. He predicted that Ms Mayawati could join any party and receive a high price in return, calling her a "predator with little ideological baggage." When Ms. Mayawati was asked where she sees herself in the future, she said she aimed to do across India what she has done in Uttar Pradesh. "Now, people in the rest of the country are watching."

What are they seeing in Uttar Pradesh? There have been large scale arrests of notorious organized crime bosses, as well as a few known criminals in her own party. Her aim is to send a strong message that the police are empowered to do their job. She has put up giant statues of Dalit icons, including one of herself in the capital city. She is proposing a nearly 600 mile, $7l5 billion highway, stretching across the state to enhance commercial traffic as well as private travel. Funded with private money, critics warn that it could be come an easy source of graft.

Corruption is the most serious criticism of Ms. Mayawati. The Central Bureau of Investigation accused Ms. Mayawati and her relatives of having illegally accumulated $2.4 million in property including a villa in the diplomatic section of New Delhi and $1.2 million in bank accounts. Ms. Mayawati denounced the charges as politically motivated. In contrast, Ms. Mayawati is called "a goddess" by her Dalit loyalists. Many say they are proud that a Dalit's daughter governs their state. Rajpal, 50 and a sweeper by caste, said, "The chief minister is our own kind. Now we are not afraid of the police. We are not afraid of the Gujjars (middle caste villagers). We are not afraid of anyone."

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On June 11, 2008, the government of Canada formally apologized to Native Canadians for forcing about 150,000 children into government residential schools for the purpose of erasing their language, traditions and culture. Prime Minister Stephen Harper, speaking in the House of Commons, with a small group of former students and native leaders sitting in front of him, said, " The treatment of children in Indian residential schools is a sad chapter in our history. Today, we recognize that this policy of assimilation was wrong, has caused great harm and has no place in our country."

The government of Canada in 1920 established a mandatory policy, requiring all native children between the ages of 7 and l6 to be part of a program called "aggressive assimilation". Children were taken from their parents, placed in residential schools and forbidden to speak their own languages or follow their religions. Most of the 130 schools were run by Christian denominations - Anglican, United, Roman Catholic and Presbyterian Churches - all practicing missionaries since the l9th century. Documented histories record that the treatment was harsh and many children suffered physical and sexual abuse. The system of schools lasted until the l970's.

Native groups have sought a formal apology from the government for years. They have also pursued legal actions against the government and the church organizations that operated the schools. A broad court-ordered settlement was won that granted payment of 1.9 billion Canadian dollars to surviving students. The court also ordered the federal government to establish a "truth and reconciliation commission" to document the experiences of the children who lived in the schools. Harry S. LaForme, a Mississauga Indian and a judge of the Ontario Court of Appeals, who will oversee the commision, said in an interview, "The policy of the Canadian residential schools wasn't to educate Indian children. It was to kill the Indian in the child. It was to erase the culture of Indian people from the fabric of Canada."

During the House of Commons session on June 11, several native leaders spoke from the floor. some in their native languages. All praised Mr. Harper for offering the apology. Phil Fontaine, an Ojibway and the national chief of the Assembly of First Nations, wore a ceremonial feathered headdress when he said, "The memories of residential schools sometimes cuts like merciless knives at our souls. Never again will this House consider us 'the Indian problem' just for being who we are." Mr. Fontaine in l990 was one of the first native leaders to reveal that he had been sexually abused while a student at a residential school in Manitoba. The Prime Minister acknowledged in his speech " tragic accounts of the emotional, physical and sexual abuse and neglect of helpless children."

The commission under Justice LaForme plans to hold hearings around the country and will have access to previously closed church records and government archives. Native leaders believe the impetus for the apology came from the precedent set in Australia earlier this year, when the government formally apologized to the aboriginal population for its policy of forced assimilation.

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Istanbul, Turkey — On July 6, 2008, Turkey's highest court ruled that a legal change allowing women to attend universities wearing head scarves was unconstitutional. The court said that the wearing of head scarves, that had been proposed by Prime Minister Erdogan and passed by Parliament in February, violated principles of secularism set up in Turkey's Constitution.

The ruling was the latest chapter in the ongoing struggle between the secular and religious groups for control of Turkish society. Mr. Erdogan, politically popular with 47 percent of the vote in an election last July, is an observant Muslim with an Islamist past. He calls the case a matter of individual rights, arguing that all Turks should be allowed to attend universities, no matter what they wear or believe. The secular elite - the judiciary, military and secular political party - contend that allowing veiled women into universities threatens one of the founding principles of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk who led the secular revolution in the l920's. Head scarves were banned in universities in the l990s.

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India. Canada. Turkey. Different issues and events that have a common thread - diverse populations and social change that moves at an uneven pace.

Joyce S. Anderson's articles have appeared in local and national publications. She is the author of "Courage in High Heels." "Flaw in the Tapestry," "If Winter Comes" and "The Mermaids Singing." She can be reached at JSAWrite@aol.com.