A bill to settle a terrible debt

COMMUNAL VIOLENCE BILL

·        It seeks to protect religious and linguistic minorities
in any state in India including SC/ST and any other social group as declared
under the law from targeted violence

·        It envisages creation of a national authority for
communal harmony, justice and reparation

·        It will investigate complaints of communal
violence and dereliction of duty

·        Similar bodies will be setup at state level

·        It has certain positives . they are

o  It expands the defn of sexual assault to cover crimes other than rape

o  It prescribes equal entitlement to relief for all those who suffer mental, physical harm in communal violence "irrespective of the fact that they belong to minority or majority group

o  it recognises dereliction of duty by public servant as a crime and can be punished with max 10 yr imprisonment

o  also no prior sanction is required from government to prosecute a pub servant in case of dereliction of duty

o  for other offenses, a sanction is to be given or rejected within 30 days with a
written explanation by government

·        drawbacks

o  it seeks to protect only the minorities and leaves out a possible scenario where a minority group targets the majority groups