No FIR against ‘purification’ ritual, but against Rahul Gandhi, who sought action against it
text_fields
The Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, who called the ‘purification’ ritual held on a stage where Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge addressed a public meeting in Uttarakhand’s Haldwani a crime and sought police action against it, has himself had an FIR filed against him following a complaint accusing him of giving the incident a caste colour and increasing enmity between communities.
The FIR against Rahul Gandhi, under the provisions of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) and the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, was registered a day after Rahul Gandhi publicly condemned the incident with the remark that Prime Minister Narendra Modi should initiate action against those responsible for the ritual.
According to Haldwani Superintendent of Police (City) Manoj Kumar Katyal, the FIR was lodged on the basis of a complaint filed by Amit Kumar, 26, a resident of Jawahar Nagar Colony, who identified himself as a member of the Valmiki community and claimed that he and other Scheduled Caste members were among those who participated in the cleaning process to establish that it did not have any untouchability angle, as alleged by Rahul Gandhi.
Kumar, in his complaint, alleged that Rahul Gandhi’s remark linking the cleaning to an act of untouchability and a crime against Scheduled Castes was against the facts, portrayed the Valmiki community as practitioners of untouchability and as being anti-Dalit, resulting in increased tension and enmity between communities.
The FIR invokes Section 196 of the BNS, concerning the promotion of enmity between different groups and acts prejudicial to the maintenance of harmony, and Section 299, relating to deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings by insulting religion or religious beliefs.
It also invokes Section 3(1)(Q) of the SC/ST Act, concerning the giving of false or frivolous information to a public servant with the intention of causing harm or annoyance to a member of a Scheduled Caste or Scheduled Tribe.
Rahul Gandhi had on Saturday accused the BJP and RSS of practising untouchability, citing similar incidents involving Congress leaders and former Bihar chief minister Jitan Ram Manjhi.
Kharge had earlier raised the Haldwani incident in the Rajya Sabha on August 13, saying the ritual performed after his speech had made him feel the ‘sting of untouchability’. He questioned how such an act could take place in a democracy and accused those associated with the BJP of insulting him after he addressed the gathering.