Deal firmly with race, language crimes: SC

New Delhi: On a petition highlighting a racially motivated attack last December that led to the death of Anjel Chakma in Uttarakhand, Supreme Court Wednesday said those who attack people for their appearance, language, race, region or origin must be dealt with an iron hand.

A bench of CJI Surya Kant and Justices Joymalya Bagchi and Vipul M Pancholi said this while expressing reluctance to enter the legislative domain and lay down a mechanism under penal law for prevention of group-perpetrated violence against people on the ground of race, place of birth and language.

Petitioner Anoop Prakash Awasthi highlighted the repeated instances of violence in many parts of the country against people from north-eastern states solely because of their physical features and said they were routinely abused with racial slurs. "Killing of Anjel Chakma is not an isolated incident but forms part of a long-standing pattern of racial violence against citizens from north-eastern states, including the death of Nido Taniam in 2014 and numerous assaults on students and workers in metropolitan cities, a phenomenon formally acknowledged by the govt in parliamentary replies, yet left unaddressed through any dedicated legislative or institutional framework," Awasthi said.

The CJI-led bench said the strong federal character of India, founded on unity of citizens despite cultural, linguistic and regional diversity, could not be allowed to be undermined by such crimes, which needed to be dealt with an iron hand.

The bench said the petitioner's plea for the court to lay down guidelines, on the lines of Vishaka judgment to prevent sexual harassment of women at the workplace, to prevent violence against people based on race, region and language till Parliament enacted a law would be better dealt with by the govt.

The court asked Awasthi to give a copy of the petition to attorney general R Venkataramani and requested the AG to take up the issue with the authorities concerned in the Union govt.
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