Like me you may have dismissed it as
yet another example of factually liberal right wing propaganda in the utterly
disgusting Nehru – Patel funeral controversy mould. That would have been the
happy ending. Unfortunately I happened to get into a debate with my father in
law on this. I told him such stuff as given in the post was not possible in a democracy and Indians
always believed more in rumour rather than actually finding out the facts for
themselves and I would do so by reading the bare act (bill in this case) and
doing the doodh ka doodh pani ka pani thingy.
To be blindsided in any debate is
galling, to be blindsided in one with one’s father in law, well better not get
into that. Anyway to get to the point, the act is linked below:
I think everyone should take time
out to read it, at 56 liberally spaced pages it isn’t terribly long and should
take less than 30 minutes to browse through.
Basically as the name suggests it
broadly defines responsibilities, parameters of response and relief in cases of
communal violence. It sets up authorities at the Central and state level with
broad based representation across majorities & minorities, Government and
opposition etc. to investigate and act upon riots with advisory and executive
roles. It defines responsibilities for various Government departments, measures
for rehabilitation & compensation, minimum standards for relief camps and
punishment in case of dereliction of duties by government officials and others
for stuff from hate propaganda to arson & torture to killing.
All this is pretty much fine and
even commendable. The problem comes with the definition of “Group”, group being the term used throughout the act for the parties whom
the act would protect. Group is defined as “religious or linguistic minority,
in any State in the Union of India, or Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes…”
(page 1, section 3(d))
Further “victim” is defined as “any person belonging to a group
as defined under this Act, who has suffered physical, mental,
psychological or monetary harm or harm to his or her property as a result of
the commission of any offence under this Act, and includes his or her
relatives, legal guardian and legal heirs, wherever appropriate” i.e.
linguistic & religious minorities. (page 2, section 3(k))
The sum of these 2 definition means
that anyone who is not a linguistic or religious minority is not covered under
the act. Now riots as anybody who has experienced them first hand would know
are never a event where only one community suffers. What would typically happen
in a riot between 2 communities is that in areas dominated by one community,
members of the other would be displaced and vice versa in areas dominated by
the other. So members of both majority and minority community would suffer
pretty much in the same manner, though the the number of people affected from
each community of the same may vary from riot to riot.
From a plain standpoint of justice any
illegal and unethical transgressions by either of the communities should be
incorrect and both should be equally deserving of punishment. However as per
the act designed to protect the victims of a riot, a victim with the double
misfortune – as there is no other way to put it – of not being in a religious
or linguistic minority is not a victim at all no matter how much he or she may
have suffered. As per the logical conclusion of the sections, this person would
not be entitled to minimum standards in relief camps, there would be no
punishment for officials who through deliberate intent or neglect may have
caused this person to suffer, nor should he be entitled to rehabilitation under
this act.
Carrying the same argument forward
using a topical example, a Muslim victim in the Muzzafarnagar riots would be a
victim entitled to the protection of the law, but an Hindu victim of the same
riot would not, which is plain ridiculous. Nor as per the law would Kashmiri
Pandits, who are a minority community in Kashmir but a majority community in
India qualify for rehabilitation, (unless they somehow come under the linguistic
minority definition).
Now one may say that there are other
laws that cover rehabilitation, redressal of justice etc for such a person.
However if that is the case those same laws are equally applicable to all
communities and religions so what is the need for a special law covering
minorities.
Secularism is quite famously not
defined in the constitution though it states that India is a secular state. A
generally accepted definition of secularism is “a doctrine that rejects
religion and religious considerations.” A second more detailed definition is
that a secular state, involves 2 doctrines;
a)
Separation
of the state from religions institutions and
b)
People
of different religions and beliefs are equal before the law
This law as per the above definition
does not seem to meet the concept of equality before law. The Indian
Constitution in Article 14 explicitly guarantees the Right to Equality before
law, “without discrimination on grounds only of religion, race, caste, sex,
place of birth or any of them”. How can then this bill that denies that right
to equality be passed under the aegis of that very constitution?
Let us not even get into the fact
that as per section 72 (page 28) “….it
shall be presumed, unless the contrary is proved, that the offence
committed was knowingly directed against a person by virtue of his or her
membership of a group. “ So basically you are guilty until proven innocent
unless you fall into the “Group”. While this seems to more suited for
Guantamano bay and tinpot dictatorships than the world’s largest democracy,
even this would be fine if there was reciprocity, which there isn’t by a long
shot.
The fact that this bill is being
sponsored and passed by the Grand Old “secular is my middle name” Party of
India is a tight slap in the face of any Indian who actually understands and
believes in secularism. In the political landscape as it exists today, it is
difficult to envisage any opposition party, either the communist parties, or
the RJD (let us not even think of the SP) or the single state regional parties
opposing this bill. Which means the only person opposing this patently
un-secular bill is (atleast by conventional definition) the least secular of
parties i.e the BJP. If that isn’t a joke, what is? God bless India….
