Dinesh Kamath's Editorial 'What is wrong with SC’s judgment?' that was published in Newsband

What is wrong with SC’s judgment?

The Supreme Court in its ruling has introduced safeguards against misuse of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989. These are just the norms to safeguard the innocent against false complaints since there is large-scale misuse of the SC/ST Act. Does the recent explosion of Dalit anger stem from the judgment? As the Bench has now agreed to hear the petition to review its own March 20 order, what is needed is a spell of calm and peace.

The Bench has declined to suspend the order and clarified that its objective was to safeguard the innocent. There are two disparate factors at play — protecting the innocent against harassment and misuse of a law, and faithfully preserving the letter and spirit of a piece of legislation aimed at upholding the rights and dignity of the historically oppressed classes. Neither should be sacrificed for the sake of the other.

The agitation was politically motivated to create disaffection against the Government.

Under current law, a dalit can accuse his superior of harassment and police can arrest the superior without enquiry. What the court wants is there should be -preliminary enquiry on the complaint and if there is substance police can arrest. What is wrong in this?

The Supreme Court Judgment did not confine itself to a specific case. instead it went on to make generalised statement on misuse of the Act. Supreme Court categorically stated that it received information from the Government that the said Act was misused. The Government furnished figures on the number of cases filed visa vis the number of convictions under Act, which appears to have made it possible for the court to draw a conclusion.

The fact is that there are two class of SC/STs. The first class is the well off one who have cornered all the benefits provided to SC/STs and does not allow the benefits to percolate to the really needy. The second class of SC/STs are the poorest one - mostly landless labourers and doing other menial jobs. This second class really requires all the safeguards and benefits provided to SC/STs. But in reality the more vocal first class not only corners all the benefits but also misuses the SC/ST act to browbeat all others. The first class SC/STs are well educated and mostly employed in Govt. or Govt owned institutions. How to safeguard the weakest without allowing misuse by the well off is the question.

The SC/ST verdict is a way to prevent the harassment of the innocents, the Law is just which has not liquidated the rights of the oppressed classes. It’s a clever plot of irrational politics which is fueling the matter into the fire. Now the apex court will scrupulously have a look again.

Legal and administrative system in the country are more broad based to the extent of being more oppressive in nature to other communities than to our Dalit brethren in terms of stringent provisions on punishments contained in almost all enactments relating to prevention of atrocities against members belonging to Dalit and tribal communities. The SC is correct to note that Constitutional protections for those accused of crimes do not disappear just because the crime is alleged to be a hate crime against Dalits.