Slamming the one-man judicial commission which concluded that Hyderabad University student Rohith Vemula was not a dalit, P.L. Punia, chairman of the National Commission for Scheduled Castes, accused it of being biased and working with the sole purpose of putting a seal of approval on what the BJP has been saying.
Punia, who completes his term as chairman of the SC commission on Saturday, said that assessing Vemula's caste was not even in the terms of reference of the A.K.Roopanwal commission, set up by the HRD ministry.
He was responding to a question on the allegations being raised that Vemula was not a dalit.
The commission, Punia said, had two terms of reference. One, they had to look into the circumstances leading to the suicide and fix responsibility. The second to scrutinise the grievance redressal mechanism in the university and suggest remedies.
“The terms of reference did not include the assessment of the caste or findings about Vemula’s caste. But the report appears to be only on the findings of the caste issue,” he said.
The revenue department is the final authority on the caste issue, he said, pointing out that it had, on numerous occasions, given caste certificate to Vemula and his siblings.
“Guntur collector gave a report when asked by the Commission, which concluded that Vemula belonged to the Scheduled Castes,” he said.
Criticising the one-man commission, he said, “The judge was not judicious. He was hired to put a seal of approval on what the BJP has been saying.”
Replying to a query on Prime Minister’s Narendra Modi’s statement that the oppressors of Dalits should rather shoot him, he said it would have been better had he said that those who will commit atrocities against Dalits will not be spared.
“The Prime Minister should not show his helplessness. He should be very emphatic in enforcing law,” Punia said.
When asked if he felt that the increase in number of complaints of discrimination and atrocities against Dalits was due to the allegedly anti-dalit attitude of the BJP governments at the Centre and in the states, Punia said officials were not taking prompt and adequate action because they felt it would not be proper for them to go against the “anti-dalit inclination” of the party in power.
He said the number of cases received by the Commission have increased from 12400 in 2013-14 to 17025 in 2016-17, and 8700 cases have already been received until September 2016. He said that this was largely due to the growing awareness amongst people belonging to the Scheduled Castes.
