The present collection comprises scanned pdf copies of sixteen Dalit periodicals from four different languages - Bangla, English, Rajbanshi and Marathi. Among those nine are Bangla Dalit periodicals - Songsaptak, Bharatbani, Adal Badal, Chaturtha Duniya, Dalit Kontho, Neer, Path Sangket, Ekhon Tokhon, and Jana Jagoron. Ujani and Dalit Mirror are the only Rajbanshi and English Periodical, respectively. The other five are Marathi Dalit periodicals - Chakravarty, Aamhi, Dhammalipi, Astitwa, and Ramai. Ten periodicals have been traced in full except for Songsaptak, Bharatbani, Path Sangket, Jana Jagoron, Ujani, and Astitwa. The six aforementioned periodicals have been partially traced and scanned. This is one limitation of the present collection. The total number of pages scanned is approximately thirteen thousand pages. Though we must reiterate the necessity to look at magnitude or numbers critically. The page numbers made available here may not give a comprehensive picture of the twentieth century Bangla and Marathi Dalit periodical cultures. In fact, the tracing of and selection for digitisation was primarily done to recover the ephemeral print that could provide readers a critical window to the later decades of twentieth century. These issues were published over fifty years, from the 1970s to 2020 in varying frequencies. Some are weeklies and monthlies, while others are bi-monthlies and even quarterlies. The frequency of publication altered in the course of the publication. Changes can be observed also in the number of pages in the subsequent issues of a given periodical. Due to the lack of adequate preservation facilities and the quality of raw materials used, most of these periodicals were insect-infested. The humid weather conditions of West Bengal and Maharashtra and the long spells of the rainy season caused water damage in many cases. Some of the issues also suffered fire damage. Owing to the archival tendency to sew multiple issues together into thick bound volumes (causing various binding and sewing damages), the physical copies not only required extremely cautious handling, but the scanning process became complicated and time-consuming. We have used our limited resources to get the best legible version ensuring no further damage is done to the physical copies. Subsequently, another limitation of the collection is that a few pages will require a little effort in reading. We would like to thank the School of Cultural Texts and Records (SCTR), Jadavpur University, for organizing a yearly digitization workshop in association with the British Library, which helped us circumvent a number of the challenges faced. Besides SCTR, we are also indebted to the Centre for Advanced Technology Solutions (CATS), GITAM, for always being there, looking after equipment management, and ensuring its smooth run throughout the fieldwork and the hectic scanning period. The present collection also contains three video interviews of editors - Kalyani Thakur Charal, Nakul Mallik and Manohar Mouli Biswas. We are indebted to Dr Intaj Ali from Netaji Subhas Open University for providing technical support in capturing and preparing these videos.

While tracing these endangered periodicals, we met with many editors, cultural activists and archivists from West Bengal and Maharashtra. We are grateful for their unconditional support for the project and the bond of love, kindness and trust. It would not have been possible to scan the periodicals and create this repository had those people not meticulously collected, safeguarded and preserved these periodicals for years despite numerous obstacles. Not only providing access to the physical copies of these periodicals, but they were generous to grant us permission to scan and make the digitized copies available for researchers. At the same time, we remember the readiness and efficiency of GITAM, Hyderabad Knowledge Resource Centre staff and librarians in providing a temporary home for these invaluable materials and ensuring their proper care.

Preparation of a descriptive catalog of the periodical collection is in progress. The following table contains the list of titles and the details of their respective archivists or and editors/proprietors from whom the physical copies and permission to digitize were obtained. We hope the registered users/visitors will also contact them to consult the physical copies. We hope this collection will make a meaningful contribution to the research on the caste question and encourage similar future projects in different Indian languages. We hope it will fashion new dialogues and rejuvenate older ties across languages. We hope all the registered users will abide by the academic ethics in accessing, using and citing these resources. Finally, we would like to reiterate that no commercial use of these periodicals is endorsed by the project or GITAM. Access is provided through registration only, and it is free of any subscription fee.