Are legal guarantees insufficient in abolishing untouchability?

Why in news? 

A ‘purification’ ritual after a Dalit leader’s rally in Uttarakhand revived debate on whether laws can end untouchability.

UPSC Relevance 

Prelims: Article 17, Protection of Civil Rights Act 1955, SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act 1989, NCSC.

Mains: 

GS1 – Salient features of Indian society, Social empowerment, Social reform movements. 

GS2 – Fundamental Rights, Mechanisms and laws for protection of vulnerable sections. 

GS4 – Social attitudes and prejudice. 

Untouchability and Caste Discrimination – Meaning

• Caste: A hereditary, endogamous social group with a fixed rank in a hierarchy, traditionally linked to occupation.
• Untouchability: The most extreme form of caste discrimination, based on the idea of ‘purity and pollution’, where certain groups are treated as polluting and are excluded from wells, temples, homes and public life.
• Not defined in law: The Constitution abolishes untouchability under Article 17 but does not define it. Courts read it in its historical sense, as practices arising from the caste system. Some important judgments on untouchability.
  • Devarajiah v. Padmanna ( 1958): Mysore HC held that “Untouchability” is not to be read literally. It means the practices that arose historically from the caste system.
  • PUDR v. Union of India (Asiad Workers case, 1982): Article 17 (with Articles 23 and 24) is enforceable against private individuals, not just the State.
  • State of Karnataka v. Appa Balu Ingale (1992): SC held that untouchability is a crime against the Constitution and an affront to human dignity. Courts must enforce the Protection of Civil Rights Act strictly.
• Two views on ending it: Ambedkar stressed legal abolition and the annihilation of caste itself (Annihilation of Caste, 1936). Gandhi stressed a change of heart among the upper castes (Harijan Sevak Sangh, 1932).  The law has come, but social conscience has not kept pace.

Legal and Constitutional Safeguards

• Constitution: Article 15 (no discrimination, including access to shops, wells, public places), Article 17 (abolition of untouchability), Article 23 (ban on forced labour), Article 46 (promotion of educational and economic interests of SCs and STs), Article 338 (National Commission for Scheduled Castes).
  • Article 17 – “Untouchability” is abolished and its practice in any form is forbidden. The enforcement of any disability arising out of “Untouchability” shall be an offence punishable in accordance with law. 
• Protection of Civil Rights Act, 1955: Originally the Untouchability (Offences) Act, renamed in 1976. Punishes the practice of untouchability.
• SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act, 1989: Covers atrocities such as social boycott, humiliation and violence. Amended in 2015 (new offences, exclusive special courts) and 2018 (no preliminary inquiry or prior approval for arrest), which the SC upheld in Prathvi Raj Chauhan (2020).
• Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Act, 2013.
• Welfare measures: Reservation, post-matric scholarships, PM-AJAY, Stand-Up India, NAMASTE scheme for sanitation workers, and the Dr. Ambedkar Scheme for Social Integration through Inter-Caste Marriages.

What the Law Has Achieved

• Open and widespread practices such as denying access to public wells, roads and institutions have declined considerably.
• Law has given Dalits and conscious sections of society a tool to fight back, even with limited resources.
• Reservation has created a Dalit middle class and political representation in legislatures, services and local bodies.
• Courts have used Article 17 strongly, for example in State of Karnataka v. Appa Balu Ingale (1992), which held untouchability is a crime against the Constitution.

Manifestations of Caste Discrimination in Modern India

• Persistent untouchability: The India Human Development Survey (2011-12) found that about 27% of households admitted practising untouchability in some form, such as not allowing Dalits into their kitchen.
• Atrocities and violence: NCRB recorded over 57,000 cases of crimes against SCs in 2022. Attacks on Dalit grooms riding horses, social boycotts and cases like Hathras (2020) show continuing violence.
• Exclusion in daily life: Two-tumbler system in tea shops, separate seating in schools, refusal to eat mid-day meals cooked by Dalit cooks, denial of temple entry, separate cremation grounds.
• Ritual ‘purification’: Washing or ‘cleansing’ places after a Dalit person’s visit, as in the present case, shows the purity-pollution idea is still alive.
• Manual scavenging: Despite the 2013 Act, hundreds of sanitation workers, most of them Dalits, have died cleaning sewers and septic tanks in recent years.
• Institutional discrimination: Caste bias in higher education (the deaths of Rohith Vemula, 2016, and Dr. Payal Tadvi, 2019), and caste-based work allocation in prisons, struck down by the SC in Sukanya Shantha v. Union of India (2024).
• Housing and jobs: Landlords refusing tenants by caste or surname; studies show job applicants with Dalit surnames get fewer callbacks.
• Honour crimes: Violence and killings in response to inter-caste marriages despite SC rulings to protect inter caste couples in Lata Singh case and Shakti vahini case. 
• Online and global caste: Casteist abuse on social media and caste-based matrimonial filters. Caste bias has also travelled abroad: Seattle banned caste discrimination in 2023 after complaints in the tech sector.
• Subtle forms: Under-representation in senior positions in the judiciary, media, academia and private sector boardrooms.

Why Does Caste Discrimination Still Persist?

• ‘Notions in the mind’: Caste is rooted in social norms and ideas of purity and pollution that are learnt in childhood. Law can punish acts, but it cannot easily change beliefs.
• Endogamy: Marriage within caste keeps caste boundaries alive. Inter-caste marriages are only about 5% of all marriages (IHDS).
• Religious and cultural sanction: Customs, rituals and caste-based temple practices continue to give legitimacy to hierarchy.
• Economic dependence: SCs own a small share of agricultural land. Many work as landless labourers dependent on dominant castes, which makes resisting discrimination risky.
• Backlash against mobility: As Dalits gain education, jobs and political voice, some dominant groups react with hostility, seen in sentiments like ‘how dare you sit next to me’.
• Spatial segregation: Separate hamlets in villages and caste-based clustering in cities reduce social contact and reinforce prejudice.
• Caste in politics: Electoral mobilisation along caste lines keeps caste identity strong, even as it gives voice to marginalised groups.
• Weak enforcement: Bias in police and local administration, under-reporting and long trials reduce the deterrent value of laws.

Way Forward

• Strengthen enforcement: Exclusive special courts, trained and sensitised police, witness protection and time-bound trials under the Atrocities Act.
• Civil law and remedies: A comprehensive anti-discrimination and equality law with a lower burden of proof, similar to the internal complaints model of the POSH Act.
• Local dispute resolution: Use Gram Sabhas and community bodies to address discrimination quickly at the local level.
• Change minds early: Revise school textbooks, train teachers and promote mixed classrooms and activities so that caste notions do not take root in children.
• Build the ‘common’: Shared public spaces, mixed housing in urban planning, and common facilities like Anganwadis and water taps instead of caste-wise ones.
• Economic empowerment: Land reforms, skilling, entrepreneurship support and credit access to reduce dependence on dominant castes.
• End manual scavenging: Full mechanisation of sewer cleaning, and enforcement of the SC’s compensation directions (Balram Singh v. Union of India, 2023).
• Diversity in institutions: Better representation in the judiciary, media and private sector; equity cells in universities.

Practice MCQ 

Q1. With reference to the abolition of untouchability in India, consider the following statements:

1. Article 17 of the Constitution defines the term ‘untouchability’.
2. “Untouchability” is to be read literally in its interpretation in the Constitution of India.
3. The right under Article 17 is available against private individuals as well as the State.

How many of the statements given above are correct?

(a) Only one     (b) Only two     (c) All three     (d) None

Answer: (a)

Explanation: Statement 1 is incorrect. The term ‘untouchability’ is not defined either in the Constitution or in the 1955 Act. Statement 2 is incorrect. “Untouchability” is not to be read literally in its interpretation in the Constitution of India but in its historical sense. 

Mains Practice Question 

“Legal guarantees against untouchability are necessary, but not sufficient.” In light of this statement, discuss the new forms in which caste discrimination manifests in contemporary India and suggest measures beyond criminal law to address it. (15 marks, 250 words)