BJP’s Dalit leaders seek review of Supreme Court order on arresting public servants under SC/ST Act
The party’s Scheduled Castes Cell chief, Vinod Kumar Sonkar, said the top court’s judgment gives impunity to harassers.
Bharatiya Janata Party’s Dalit legislators met Minister for Social Justice and Empowerment Thawar Chand Gehlot on Wednesday to express their unhappiness over the Supreme Court’s judgment that protects a public servant from being arrested under the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act without a preliminary inquiry and the approval, The Indian Express reported.
The MPs asked Gehlot to take up the matter with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and asked the government to file a review plea in court.
In a move aimed at curbing the alleged misuse of the Act, the top court said an officer not below the rank of deputy superintendent must conduct a preliminary inquiry before a public servant is taken into custody.
“There could be exceptions and some may have misused the law,” Ashok Kumar Dohrey, BJP’s Etawah MP, told the newspaper. “But there are too many incidents of attacks and atrocities against the communities. The Dalit community is too weak to misuse the laws in many parts of the country. Despite stringent laws, most of the cases are not even getting registered due to pressure from different sources.”
The chief of BJP’s Scheduled Castes cell, Vinod Kumar Sonkar, said the Supreme Court’s judgment gives impunity to harassers. He said the order violates the fundamental protection provided by the Constitution for the weaker sections.
“What Kanshiram [founder of the Bahujan Samaj Party] said decades ago has come true,” an unidentified Dalit BJP leader told The Indian Express. “He had warned that the Manuvadis [upper caste] would use the judiciary to attack us. That’s happening now.”
The Congress on Wednesday had said if the Supreme Court’s judgment is not reviewed, it will be very unfortunate. “There is a feeling of insecurity among the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes and other oppressed classes.” The party called for a review of the decision in “national interest”.