Times of
India: Ahmedabad: Sunday, 01 March 2020.
Dalits
seem to bear the brunt of caste-based violence in the state with 1,500 cases of
atrocities reported in 2019. These include 32 murder cases, 81 assault and 97
rape cases. This indicates that on an average nearly five cases of atrocities
were reported last year.
Figures
between 2001 and 2019 suggest a rise in cases till 2018. In 2019, there was a
nominal decrease of 45 cases than 2018, however, in 2019 the state saw three
Dalit youths being stopped from riding horses in marriage processions in
Arvalli, Sabarkantha and Mehsana districts by upper caste people. Recently, a
Dalit youth was beaten for riding horse in his marriage in Palanpur town of
Banaskantha.
In
2019, Ahmedabad reported the highest 164 cases followed by Junagadh where 102
cases were reported. Ahmedabad city also reported six murders, 16 rape cases of
Dalit women and 10 cases of grievous injuries.
Police
committed a goof-up in invoking the atrocities act in 2019 against the director
of the national award winning film ‘Hellaro’ who is himself a Dalit.
These
figures have been obtained from an RTI plea filed in Gujarat DGP office by a
civil rights activist Kaushik Parmar.
Parmar
said that the cases have increased as Dalits are still not being given equal
treatment in society.
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