I can see where Dick is focused - Kipling's representation gives no sense of Din's consciousness of his own condition, no agency. He's an Indian straw man for Kipling. Good point. This goes back around to the earlier observation about "white saviors" - Kipling writes from the point of view of the narrator/soldier who is praising Din. A poem written from Gunga Din's POV, whether written by Kipling or someone else (possibly an Indian author!) would be starkly different.

I wonder how an activist, someone like Audre Lorde, might have written that poem. (I've shared some of her poetry here before - a Google search lands on my post from July 4, 2008 when Jesse Helms died.)