-Frontline.in The British government, on the basis of an 1891 report on the subhuman living conditions of “Pariahs” by James H.A. Tremenheere, Acting Collector of Chengleput, assigned 12 lakh acres of land for distribution to the “depressed classes” of the Madras Presidency to empower them socially and economically. But more than 100 years later, much of this land is in the possession of non-Dalits, and the struggle to reclaim them has...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: The Sureme Court today sought responses from the Centre and six states on a public interest petition seeking a ban on cow vigilante groups across the country. These states are Gujarat -where cow vigilantes' public flogging of four Dalit men in July sparked a countrywide furore - Maharashtra, Karnataka, Rajasthan, Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh. Maharashtra-based social activists and Congress sympathisers Tehseen Poonawala and his brother Shehzad Poonawala had moved...

-The Hindu The sense of impunity that drives discrimination against Dalits is at the heart of recent demands for the dilution, or even repeal, of the Act for prevention of atrocities against SCs and STs It is the sense of impunity nurtured by caste hierarchy that prepares the social ground for the “shockingly cruel and inhumane” crimes against Dalits called atrocities. It is this impunity that the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled...

-The Indian Express While crimes against Dalits are increasing, the state has time and again let them down, with little action against the perpetrators. Atrocities against Scheduled Castes (SCs) and Scheduled Tribes (STs) are a regular feature of the caste-based Indian society and distressingly, of late, they have begun increasing. What is ironical is that only recently, the country commemorated the 125th birth anniversary of B .R. Ambedkar, the icon of the...

-The Hindu The object of the amended provisions is to speed up the process of dispensation of justice, liberalise and expedite access to relief for victims of atrocities. Four months after Parliament amended the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act of 1989 to tighten provisions to ensure speedier justice to SCs and STs, the Social Justice and Empowerment Ministry notified the Rules to give effect to the changes...