Skip to main content

New Gujarat government order on norms for compensation to Dalit and tribal atrocity victims "lacks clarity"

By A Representative
In an order, the Gujarat government has declared that the tribals and Dalits, who become victims of atrocities perpetrated by a group consisting of tribals or Dalits, on one hand, and other communities, on the other, would also be compensated under the prevention of scheduled tribe and caste (ST/SC) atrocities Act. Issued ahead of the declaration of the Lok Sabha elections, on February 24, 2014, the order has come in the wake of incidents like Patan gang rape case, in which two of the five convicted for life -- Manish Parmar and Ashwin Parmar -- were Dalits. Non-Dalits convicts are Kiran Patel, Mahendra Prajapati and Suresh Patel.
Senior Dalit activist Kantilal Parmar of the Navsarjan Trust, a Dalit human rights organization in Ahmedabad, said, while the decision was welcome, it has not only come too late, but has failed to take into account past cases. “Ever since the rules for providing compensation to tribal and Dalit victims were promulgated on March 31, 1995 under the anti-atrocities Act, between 200 and 250 tribals and Dalits must have suffered at the hand of groups which consisted of tribals or Dalits and other communities. It is not clear whether they will get compensation”, he said.
Parmar said, as an exceptional case, the Patan gang rape victim was compensated against, but this has not been the case in other instances, when the perpetrators consist of non-Dalits and Dalits or tribals and non-tribals, too. Refusing to pay compensation to the victims, the Gujarat government would “assiduously” cite a government resolution of October 16, 1982, which said that compensation cannot be paid under the anti-atrocities Act “in case the atrocity is committed by person of the same community”, i.e., Dalits or tribals.
“The order, issued on February 24, 2014, should have come not today, but two decades ago, when new norms for compensation were announced”, Parmar insisted, adding, “Now it seems necessary for all those who have not been paid compensation for wrongly interpreting the Act to approach the court of law in order to get justice. The atrocity against them was treated as falling under criminal procedure code.” Significantly, there has also been a demand from a section of the Dalits that atrocities committed on Dalits from within the community should also be paid compensation at the same basis as others.
Those who believe that Dalit victims of atrocities should get compensation even if the atrocity is committed by Dalits point out that there is caste hierarchy even within the Dalits, which is overlooked by the law. At the lowest rung fall the Valmikis, who are forced to do manual scavenging, and they are often treated as untouchables for so-called upper caste Dalits. “This has come to light in several studies”, a senior Dalit expert points out, adding, “Intra-Dalit conflicts, unfortunately, are a major hindrance in the fight against atrocities against Dalits. Unless this is overcome, it is not possible to proceed ahead.”

Comments

Post a Comment

TRENDING

From margins to microphones: The rise of Dalit hip-hop in India

By Tersina Maria Toppo*  A protest does not always arrive as a slogan shouted from a street corner. Sometimes, it arrives on a beat. A microphone replaces the megaphone, a music video becomes a public square, and the smartphone becomes the space where a history once pushed to the margins is narrated, debated, and shared.
2 comments
»

UCC push would lead to state surveillance, erosion of women’s rights: Feminist alliance

By A Representative   The All-India Feminist Alliance (ALIFA) has issued a sweeping condemnation of the push to implement Uniform Civil Codes (UCCs) across 21 BJP- and NDA-ruled states, warning that the legislation masquerades as gender justice while fundamentally expanding state surveillance, criminalizing consensual relationships, and undermining the constitutional and economic rights of women and marginalized communities. 
Post a Comment
»

Xi Jinping’s visit to USA: Recognition that China can't be contained?

By Vijay Prashad   President Xi Jinping’s forthcoming visit to the United States must be understood as more than an encounter between two heads of state, but it must be seen as an encounter between two possible futures. In one future, the United States imposes a spiral of confrontation against China. Trade disputes harden into economic warfare, then economic warfare intensifies into technological blockades, technological blockades produce military encirclement, and finally military encirclement creates incidents, and incidents the danger of becoming an unimaginable war.
Post a Comment
»