Rajasthan High Court: Rajasthan High Court has given a big verdict in a case registered under the Scheduled Tribes Act. The High Court rejected the caste-indicative words in the SC-ST Act and said that words like Bhangi, Neech, Bhikhari and Mang. are not caste-indicative.
The matter pertains to talks with government employees during the decommissioning process. After this the matter reached the court. The court removed the section of SC-ST Act against the four accused for using these words. The bench of Justice Virendra Kumar has given this decision in a 13 year old case.
The matter is of Jaisalmer police station. A case was registered here on January 31, 2011 under the SC-ST Act. Harishchandra along with other officers went to investigate the pressure exerted by Achal Singh. While surveying a site in that area, Achal Singh called Harishchandra, a government official, in derogatory language including beggar, beggar, ugly and bhangi. On this, a case was registered against Achal Singh by the government officials in the police under the SC-ST Act.
Charges challenged under SC-ST Act
Four people were accused in the case. All four had challenged the charges under the SC-ST Act. The appellants said that they did not know the caste of the victim. During the hearing of the case, the Appellant’s lawyer Leeladhar Khatri said that there is no information about the caste of the Appellant. There is no evidence that such words were uttered and the incident occurred in public, while a police investigation found allegations of racial slurs to be unfounded.
Appellant acquitted
The High Court ruled that the words bhangi, mang., beggar and neech are not gender discriminatory. It will not be included in the SC, ST Act. Meanwhile, the Appellant was acquitted of the charge of using sexist words.
