Another killed : the father of Indian Constitution would be ashamed of this India

Mirah Zamin

The vision with which Ambedkar laid the foundation of India’s Constitution has been shaken again. A Schedule caste from Rajkot, Gujarat, was beaten to death.

Mukesh Vaniya, was tied to a factory door and repeatedly beaten with a metal rod by factory workers when he and his wife went to gather scraps according to a video clip circulated on social media by Dalit right activist and Gujarat’s MLA Jignesh Mevani. While Vaniya’s wife escaped, he was declared dead brought dead at the hospital.

Mevani in his Facebook post wrote, “This is far more gruesome incident than Una,” referring to 2016 Una incident in which a group of young Dalit men were chained to the back of a vehicle and beaten with iron rods.

He further added, “In Una, the victims were beaten up and humiliated. Whereas, here a man lost his life amidst caste violence.”

In his tweet, Mevani wrote ‘Mr. Mukesh Vaniya belonging to a scheduled caste was miserably thrashed and murdered by factory owners in Rajkot and his wife was brutally beaten up’. #GujaratIsNotSafe4Dalit and shared an 18 seconds video of the same.

Mevani gained popularity with the incident in Una. It is believed that the death of Dalit scholar Rohit Vemula and atrocities against dalits in Gujarat became the making point for the rise of a new political system in India.

The incident happened when Vaniya and his wife Jayaben were looking for work and refused to pick garbage lying outside the factory for free, it is then that the five accused told them that it was their duty to do so because they belong to a low caste according the statement by Jayaben given to the police.

It is then that the accused started to misbehave with Jayaben, touched her shoulder and punched in the face. Soon Vaniya came to his wife’s rescue while she ran away to get help. Though the video circulated by Mevani is that of 18 seconds but the assault allegedly lasted for more than two hours according to the FIR.

The five accused have been arrested and a murder case has been filed under the SC/ST Act.

The BJP government in power has released compensation of Rs 8.5 lakhs but is money the replacement of one’s life. And, why is it that the most gruesome of atrocities against the Bahujans happen in the State of Gujarat. Why is it that even after Una, the government hasn’t done anything crucial in this way.

According to Harsha, an NGO worker who works for Bahujan rights in Gujarat says “this is the worst kind of democracy that today we are living in, humans are ill-treating humans but nothing is being done about it constitutionally in a country which has a secular ideology”.

Soon after the tweet went viral on twitter, many went on to comment with hashtag #MevaniNotSafe4Gujarat.

“The people of India should now understand, that Modi and his BJP will only cause harm to India”, said a member of Bhim army.

Many student bodies throughout the states of Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Kerala, Andhra Pradesh will be sitting for protest demanding an answer for the atrocities on Bahujan as per the sources.