Hate Crime in India

Introduction:

Our laws always stride the treacherously thin and thick membrane between rights and restrictions. These steps are taken to maintain peace and internal balance, but we all know hate crime cases are increasing at a great pace. Freedom of speech and expression is misused to create hate about something/someone in the heads of other people. For every crime, there is a mastermind who sets the plan. In India, we can see cases where a minority is affected by the majority and vice-versa (rarest). These masterminds don’t understand “Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam”, they wanted to prove that their ideas are always correct without even thinking of future consequences. Hate crime is a crime, typically one involving violence, that is motivated by prejudice on the basis of race, religion, sexual orientation, or other grounds.^[1] Here, either physical or physiological, or both types of harm caused to the victim. Hate speech or any activity that hurts sentiments of a particular community is a major catalyst for hate crimes.

India is well known for unity in diversity and a “secular” state, then why and how the year 2018 became the hate crime year. There are no well-established laws that curb such practices. Other countries have strict laws and no compromise on justice is tolerated. People are largely active in mob lynching, sedation, and unethical activities. In such crimes, no place for humanity exists. I can’t understand why the notion of equality is misused. Also, Gandhi in his “Ramrajya” principle taught every person should not be left unheard. Law is clear you can criticize the government, but cannot criticize the existence of the state and tarnish the sovereignty of it. Then, why Criticizing the wrongdoings of the government is treated as sedition! I will address many cases where cow protection is more sacred than saving the life of a human, where religion teaches to kill enemies, where taking birth in lower caste and class families is a curse and where three pillars of the legal system seem silent.

The research article might be controversial but indeed focuses on the evil reality of the era we are living in. We will understand the reasons, effects, statistics, role of law in halting the hate crimes till the end of this article.

Body of Research

In layman’s language, the crimes which occur due to hate which is filled inside criminals towards a certain person or his community. Hate crimes are generally seen in many ways such as physical assault, threat calls, communal riots, taunting, defamatory statements, abusive gestures, and many more. It destroys national integrity, peace, and harmony. In the case of S.Rangarajan etc v. P. Jagjivan Ram^[2], the Court held that freedom of expression cannot be suppressed unless the situation so created is dangerous to the community/ public interest wherein this danger should not be remote, conjectural or far-fetched. I somehow disagree with the judgment, why to wait for destruction? SC should analyze the defamatory or derogatory speech in all different perspectives. Strict action must be taken if that expression is found to be violating or hurting sentiments of a particular community. Article 19(1)(a) provides freedom of speech and expression, only to ensure that no innocent or victim is left unheard and expresses their opinions. But, this also comes with restrictions like article 19(2) to ensure misuse will not be done in the future.

1. Hate crimes by social media:

Facebook in their ‘Transparency records’ disclosed that 3 million hateful posts in 2018.^[3] Youtube which is popularly used also reports and removes 25,000 videos in a month.^[4] Remember the recent boys locker room and girls locker room case, an excellent example. where hate was spread through a full-fledged plan. Social media is misused. Readers are well aware of Youtube versus TikTok clashes, where TikTok had a bad rating of around 1.2. Faizal Siddhique’s account was suspended for glorifying acid attacks and promoting patriarchy. Acid attacks in India are nothing new, and less than five percent is the rate of conviction which is shameful.^[5]

Another hate speech incident where drunk Venkataraman uploaded a 56-second video that aims to insult Dalit group. He was encouraged by 18 year old boy Vijay and was killed by a mob^[6]. People are spreading inflammatory speeches and messages on social media which later unexpectedly becomes a source of riots.

2. Hate Crime on & by Children:       

There was one incident where a mob brutally killed children – On 22 June 2017, Junaid a 15-year-old Muslim boy and other 3 children were traveling through train to Delhi for upcoming eid shopping. This was their last journey. A mob came and allegedly argued for a train seat. Later, that mob threw their skull caps, pulled their beard, and slapped and kicked very brutally. Later, they were thrown on a railway platform.^[7]

Another incident where a 15-year old Dalit child was harassed and assaulted by higher class people The incident was in Ahmedabad, Gujrat.^[8]

Another incident where a 16-year-old child Dalit boy was inhumanly beaten by classmates who belong to upper-caste.^[9] I think and I believe that killing an innocent child just because of his social background or something else is the biggest sin. Deep down, children are also prepared for future hate crimes. Children are motivated and convinced and create hate in their brains to a particular community. This needs to stop and the state should look after it vigilantly.

3.  Hate Crime on & by Religion:

Religion is the basic identity for all. It depicts the culture, rituals, customs, and historical background you came from. Hurting someone’s religious sentiments or misrepresenting or taunting on their holy practices is what creates enmity. What if I say that a politician, CM of UP promotes such 7 hateful & inflammatory speeches. At one time, he broke curfew and gave a hateful speech against Muslims in Gorakhpur.

Soon later, it resulted in a riot. In 2011, Yogi said, “Hindu people should dig a grave of Muslim women and rape the corpses.” In 2015, Yogi said, “If Muslims take one Hindu girl, we (Hindus) will take 100 Muslim girls”&” If they kill one Hindu, we will kill 100 Muslims.”^[10] Yet, Allahabad high court defends him citing a lack of evidence and tampered evidence video. Even though the video recorded was available on youtube.^[11] These speeches mainly occurred during elections, where S.123 of RP Act. If HC defends him on flaw points, where is equality before law and IPC? In India, the majority (Hindus) worship cows and adopt laws for the prohibition of slaughtering. Though cow slaughtering or selling of beef hurts sentiments of the majority, the majority should not take laws in their hands just on suspicious grounds. On July 21, 2018, Rakbar Khan was lynched and murdered for the transportation of cows in Rajasthan’s Alwar district. Media reports say that police officials took 3 hours to carry a -patient in the hospital and it was just 6 KM distance. Also, the cows were taken earlier to their shelter than the injured patient.

On June 27, 2017, Usman Ansari, a dairy farmer was beaten by a mob and his house was set on fire. The mob was frustrated because a dead cow was found outside his home.^[12] On April 6, 2017, Mohammed Shalik was beaten to death because of his relationship with a Hindu girl. Recently, CAA protests and Delhi riots, where many minorities were killed.^[13] The law itself created a division of unity on religion. In these hard times, one more inhuman incident occurred. Here, Muslim volunteers who were helping slum-dwellers to provide food. A mob of 10 people attacked them with cricket bats. A day before the incident, a man warned those volunteers saying, “why must you do it in a Hindu area?” ^[14]

The practice of jihad- where a religion says to attack enemies if their religion is endangered. The terrorist masterminds have misused it and made innocent people as weapons. Remember, terrorists are not born, but are created.

4. Statistics:^[15]

1. 902 hate crime cases between Sept 2015 to June 2019.

2. UP is the leading state (216), Tamilnadu (80), Rajasthan (59), and Karnataka (48) in reported hate crime cases.

3. 619 cases against Dalits, 113 cases encouraged by cow vigilantism.

4. As racism is not seen much in India, there is no statistics or numbers of race hate crime.

5. Role of law:

Our law prohibits hate crimes, not by concrete or specialised statute. S.153A, 153B, 295A, 505(1), of IPC deals with punishment on hate speech which leads to serious damage to life and property. The Representation of People’s Act limits down the cheap work and vote-seeking techniques through religion name. Because, we need to understand, India is secular and has no official religion. S.66 of the Information Technology Act applies to online users to penalize if any act is done dishonestly and fraudulently. S. 223(a) of CrPC prohibits mob lynching. Also, the regular laws for murder, attempt to murder, rape, etc are to govern the people. Bur, what about the procedure? What about implementation? The poor or minority people are suffering from the majority and are threatened and forced to not file a legal suit. Police officers sometimes reject the claim and refuse to register FIR due to societal pressure on them.

Conclusion

Hate crimes are mostly due to intolerance, religious hate, the dominance of ideologies, etc. If India adopts a concrete statute of hate crime then things are expected to get better. There should be an appointment of special investigating teams instead of CBI, CID which is run by the state or central government. GOI itself needs to understand the situation and work accordingly. Politicians who promote hate crimes (if found) should not get a chance to stand again in elections.

Present Scenario – If we observe carefully, hate crimes, and fuelling is done amid COVID to create internal imbalance and conflicts, GOI needs to put a full stop on hate crimes by enacting concrete laws on it. If this problem is ignored, China is waiting to lodge a war. China has already intruded till F5 & F4 in the name of patrolling the grey area of Pangong lake. It’s high time for GOI to decide quickly.

We are already facing the pandemic and other disasters. Hate crime in addition to it will make our country back foot. Hate crimes are crimes that hate the existence of humanity on this planet.

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References:

^[1]Definition of Hate crime, lexico, https://www.lexico.comxdefinition/hate_crime

^[2]  S.Rangarajan etc v. P. Jagjivan Ram, 1989 SCC (2) 574

^[3] Facebook Community Report, https://transparency.facebook.com/community-standards-enforcement#hate-speech

^[4]  Geoffrey A. Fowler , Drew Harwell et. al, “2018 was the year of online hate. Meet the people whose lives it changed” , The Washington Post, Dec. 28, 2018,https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/2018-was-the-year-of-online-hate-meetthe-people-whose-lives-it-changed/2018/12/28/95ac0558-f7dd-11e8-8c9a860ce2a8148f_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.89512577b520.

^[5] Shubhangi Mishra,Harder to act on rape culture in Indian schools, The  print (May 21, 2020, 3:15pm IST),  https://theprint.in/opinion/pov/bad-rating-to-tiktok-on-play-store-is-easy-harder-to-act-on-rape-culture-in-indian-schools/426380.

^[6] Nilesh Christopher, Tik Tok is fuelling India’s deadly hate speech epidemic, wired (Aug 12, 2019), https://www.wired.co.uk/article/tiktok-india-hate-speech-caste

^[7] Amit Verma & archir sen, In the face of violence: Children and hate crimes in India,

Aljazeera (Apr 6, 2018), https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/face-violence-children-hate-crimes-india-180406092438358.html.

^[8] Supra note 7.

^[9] Supra note 7.

^[10]7 controversies and cases against Yogi Adityanath you must know, Asianet, https://newsable.asianetnews.com/india/7-controversies-and-cases-against-yogi-adityanath-you-must-know

^[11]Uttar Pradesh justifies decision not to prosecute Yogi Adityanath in hate speech, Hindustan Times (Mar 25,2019), https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/uttar-pradesh-justifies-decision-not-to-prosecute-yogi-adityanath-in-hate-speech/story-llvj1ixPbtV0IZ5KjzbXgJ.html

^[12]India: Hate crimes against Muslims and rising Islamophobia must be condemned, Amnesty International (Jun28,2017),https://www.amnesty.nl/actueel/india-hate-crimes-against-muslims-and-rising-islamophobia-must-be-condemned.

^[13] Supra note 5

^[14]Hate crimes against India’s Muslims are spreading with Covid-19, scroll (Apr 7, 2020), https://scroll.in/article/958543/the-other-virus-hate-crimes-against-indias-muslims-are-spreading-with-covid-19.

^[15] Halt the hate, Amnesty University, https://amnesty.org.in/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/Halt-The-Hate-KeyFindings-Amnesty-International-India-1.pdf.