DALITS/SCHEDULED CASTES - 2013 - Indian Social Institute

United Progressive Alliance government seems to think that by addressing the sense of insecurity ofDalits and tribals, it will be able to build a sizeable vote bank. The idea is to define “atrocities” a little morecomprehensively so that if a Dalit or a tribal is prevented from contesting elections or such an electedperson is prevented from discharging his duties or if any of them is socially or economically boycotted, thelaw can be used against the guilty. One crucial change proposed is that the accused should have theforeknowledge that the victim is a Dalit or a tribal if the Act is to be invoked against him. Be that as it may,during the two decades the Act has been in force, it has not curbed the number of cases of atrocitiesagainst the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes. Far from that, the figures available with theNational Crime Records Bureau suggest that atrocities against Dalits have more than doubled during thisperiod. Even when the Bahujan Samaj Party was in power in Uttar Pradesh when the maximum numberof cases were registered under the Act, there was no let-up in the atrocities against Dalits. Policecontinue to show reluctance to register cases under the Act and even when cases are registered, they failon the investigation front. Small wonder that the conviction rate in such cases has been abnormally low. Italso needs to be pointed out that there have been instances when the law, which has stricter provisionsfor bail, was misused to punish innocent persons. The anti-rape law was strengthened recently but it hasnot reduced incidents of rape. Similarly, to expect the amended Act to reduce caste-based atrocities isnot to know the social roots of caste discrimination, which needs to be fought socially, politically,economically and legally. (New Indian Express 26/6/13)MP Dalit sarpanch begs for survival (2)Bhopal: A Dalit sarpanch in Damoh district makes both ends meet by occasionally begging in the villagewhere she is supposed to be in a decision-making role. Unlettered, Rajni Bansal was elected as sarpanchof the reserved Bachhama gram panchayat seat in 2010 when she was forced to contest. It's been morethan three years but she has not attended the office. The plight of the mother of five seems to haveworsened because she does not even get the honorarium on time and the villagers have stoppedemploying her labourer husband. She is called to hoist the Tricolour because that's customary, probablythe only time she gets any invitation. Moved by her plight after reading a newspaper report, BJP MLAfrom Hata Umadevi Khatik has decided to help her. "It's a poor, backward and undeveloped region. Shedoes not know her job because she is uneducated,'' she said. Chief executive officer of Hata JanpadPanchayat Anand Shukla said he had sent "a fact-finding team" to the remote village where access hasbeen made difficult by rains. He claimed it was unlikely that the woman has taken to begging as thegovernment was providing food grains at nominal rate to BPL and Antyodaya families. A previouspanchayat secretary had been removed because he allegedly made her put thumb impression on files.Since then development work in the panchayat has stopped. Shukla and Khatik hinted there wereirregularities in the panchayat's accounts. Executive director of Samarthan Yogesh Kumar said merereservation won't bring about women's empowerment. He said in Rajni's case, there was a need forreforms because seats are reserved in accordance with the SC/ST population in the entire block. Thesereserved seats are randomly chosen creating a situation when SCs or STs are in much less numbers inthat particular seat leading to unwilling candidates getting elected. (Indian Express 27/6/13)Classmates attack Dalit boy in school (2)MADURAI: Barely 20 days after the footwear on head punishment for a 12-year-old Dalit student;another harassment incident was reported in the district on Tuesday in which a class XII boy belonging toa SC community was abused and attacked by a group of caste Hindu students. Sources said that (namechanged) Raja (17) son of Sarkkarai, attached with Dalit community, Andipatti Pudhur in Tiruvadavur,was a student of class XII in government higher secondary school in Tiruvadavur. Police said during agame session in the class, an altercation broke out between two groups of students. A group of fivecaste Hindu students attacked Raja and abused him using his caste name. Raja, who was injured in theattack, was admitted to the GRH, police said. Based on a complaint from Raja, police registered a case