Supreme Court ruling on SC/ST Act: Congress demands review petition

The Centre did not present the case well because it suited its [the Centre’s] agenda, the Congress alleges.

NEW DELHI, 17/03/2018: Congress President Rahul Gandhi along with his predecessor Sonia Gandhi at the inauguration of two days Congress Plenary Session at Indira Gandhi Stadium, in New Delhi on March 17, 2018. Photo: Sandeep Saxena

Prompted by Congress chief Rahul Gandhi, senior leaders of the party in Parliament on Wednesday demanded that the Centre should file a review petition against the Supreme Court ruling on the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989, or bring an amendment to undo the top court’s ruling.

The court ruling is aimed at preventing misuse of the law as under existing provisions, whereby merely filing a complaint under the SC/ST Act empowers the police to immediately arrest an accused without preliminary investigation.

Many argue that the provisions of the law are abused to blackmail officials into submission but the Congress countered that any law can be prone to misuse.

The party said the Supreme Court effectively took away the teeth of the law that was meant to be a powerful deterrent against crimes targeting Dalits and tribals.

MP sees conspiracy

The Congress further alleged that the Centre was party to the case in the Supreme Court and did not present the case well because it suited its [the Centre’s] agenda.

“I won’t call it a dilution but a conspiracy to end the law itself and take away the benefits and protection that the Constitution and the Act guaranteed, and this suits the RSS (Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh) and the BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party),” said Kumari Selja, Congress Rajya Sabha MP.

Critical component

The political importance of the issue for Mr. Gandhi can be gauged from the fact that the Congress’ seniormost leaders in the Rajya Sabha (Ahmed Patel, Anand Sharma, Kumari Selja and Raj Babbar) along with younger leaders known to be close to him (Jyotiraditya Scindia and Randeep Singh Surjewala) addressed a joint press conference. Dalit outreach has been an important part of Mr. Gandhi’s politics.

Mr. Scindia, who’s the chief whip of the party in the Lok Sabha, alleged that at first the BJP-RSS had wanted to end reservations for SC/STs and now wanted dilution [of the Act].

Congress communication chief Randeep Surjewala said the Centre and the Maharashtra government had not presented the case properly in the SC.