Top court refuses to stay changes in SC/ST Act

The Supreme Court on Thursday refused to stay its verdict diluting provisions of the SC/ST Atrocities Act despite the Centre blaming the March 20 judgement for the increased assaults on members of Scheduled Castes/Scheduled Tribes which were not being registered as First Information Report (FIR) by police.

Appearing for the Centre, Attorney General KK Venugopal referred to several news reports that showed a spurt in crimes against SC/ST community in the month of April. As the order of the court required police to first conduct a preliminary enquiry before registering FIR and then seek consent of appointing authority (where accused is public servant) or Senior Superintendent of Police (where accused is non-public servant) before arrest, Venugopal submitted that none of the cases were getting lodged and fearing contempt, no police officer was willing to lodge FIR without following the new procedure set out by the court.

The Bench of Justices Adarsh K Goel and UU Lalit, hearing the review petition of the Centre, agreed to hear the Centre and amicus curiae further on May 16. To a request made by Additional Solicitor General (ASG) Tushar Mehta appearing with A-G for stay of judgment in the meantime, the bench refused. It clarified that the judgment of Court does not intend to shield offenders and there was no way a case should not be registered if it involves grievous offences against SC/ST.

“If there is a grave offence, this judgment will not come in the way of arrest,” the bench said, adding that the intention of its decision was to ensure that innocents be not arrested on frivolous complaints since the Act prohibits anticipatory bail on the lines of harsher laws meant to punish grave offences like MCOCA, TADA, and other anti-terror laws. “The safeguards were for the purpose that a person should not be readily arrested or an innocent punished because there was no provision of anticipatory bail under the SC/ST Act,” the bench said.

A-G said that in his view offences against SC/ST was equally grave and faulted the Court order as being an exercise of judicial law-making by breaching separation of power principle. Since the judgment sought to amend Section 18 and Section 4 of SC/ST Act (anticipatory bail and filing of FIR) and Section 41 of CrPC (power of arrest), the matter ought to be referred to a larger bench, he added.