Atrocities on SC/ST rising, says government data
The hate crimes were reported from major tribal-dominated states between January and November 2016.
New Delhi: Despite a law envisaging stringent provisions against perpetrators of atrocities against SC and ST people, the National Commission for Scheduled Tribes (NCST) saw a spurt in complaints of atrocities against them.
The hate crimes were reported from major tribal-dominated states between January and November 2016.
The SCs and STs (Prevention of Atrocities) Amendment Act, 2015, which was enforced in January 2016, envisaged stringent provisions for atrocities against members of these communities.
According to information available with this newspaper, the NCST received considerable number of complaints on atrocities against scheduled tribes between January and November 2016 in tribal-dominated states such as Jharkhand, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. The complaint disposal rate was also low.
Between January and November 2016, the NCST received 185 complaints related to atrocities against STs from Jharkhand, which has 26 per cent tribal population. But only 12 of them have been disposed off while action in the remaining 173 is under process. In 2015, the number of complaints received by the commission from Jharkhand was 141. This shows that there was a massive 31 per cent increase in the number of complaints from the state within a year.
The number of complaints rose in 2016, the year when the amended legislation came into force. Out of the 141 complaints received by the commission in 2015, only 66 of them could be disposed off.