Over 1.44 lakh cases of extremely wicked against Scheduled Castes and 23,408 cases of atrocities against Scheduled Tribes came for trial before the judiciary in 2016, according to the last available data from the National Crime Records Bureau. In this, only 10 per cent SC cases finished trial and and other legal proceduers later, just a fourth of this number ended in convictions. In case of STs, 12 per cent cases completed trial and a fifth of these ended in convictions.
The lower rate of convictions denote to an unfinished agenda identified in the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act – the law, commonly called the SC/ST Act, requires all states to provide for an ample number of Special Courts that can hear cases of atrocities against SC/STs. Yet, of the 700-odd districts in India, merely 194 districts across 14 states have set up such exclusive Special Courts; the rest have simply designated their existing overworked Sessions Courts as Special Courts.
Ramesh Nathan, general secretary of the advocacy group National Dalit Movement for Justice, says that most cases wind up in acquittals as prosecutors, often political appointees, don’t provide proper evidence. “They don’t brief the victims or the witnesses, who are also subjected to intimidation outside the court.”
Advocate Rahul Singh, who has intervined in several cases of atrocities, notes that a section of the SC/ST Act allows victims to opt a public prosecutor of their like. “It’s a little-used section and is never implemented,” says Singh.
Post-Independence, all legislation was replaced with the Untouchability (Offences) Act, 1955, that gave legal shape to Article 17 of the Constitution which abolishes the practice of untouchability. “In 1969, the historic Elayaperumal Committee recommended that the act of untouchability is a violation of citizenship rights and based on that, the legislation was renamed as Protection of Civil Rights Act (PCR) in 1976,” observes Thorat.
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