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Journalism of Courage
DEHRA DUN, July 27: A Dalit woman was beaten up and paraded naked by villagers in Kantari near Uttarkashi last fortnight for entering a temple where women are not allowed.
And instead of registering a case against the assaulters, the local administration ordered her arrest and put her in jail for two days for “desecrating the temple.”
The woman, Atula Devi, is said to have gone to the temple in Kantari, 17 kilometres from her village, Srikot, to pray after repeated requests to get the wages for the repair works done by her husband Jadubir Singh at the temple were turned down by the villagers.
The villagers allegedly beat her, cut her hair and paraded her naked for “desecrating the temple” of the snake god in Kantari where women are not allowed. The Sub-Divisional Magistrate (SDM), Purola sub-division, Jagdish Tripathi visited the spot and allowed the villagers to register a case against Atula. She was arrested and taken to the jail in Tehri.
Two days later, District Magistrate (DM) Uttarakashi, Narendra Nath Pandey sent the SDM Badkot, Anil Pathak, to the spot to “undo the damage” caused by Tripathi’s “lapse”. Pathak ordered Atula’s release and allowed her to file a First Information Report (FIR) under the Scheduled Castes Act. In the FIR, Atula said that the residents of Kantari cut her hair, beat her up and paraded her naked on the streets. The local unit of the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and Dalit organisations have threatened to launch an agitation if the district administration failed to bring the guilty to book.
Top district administration officials felt that the “tactless” handling of the incident by the SDM led to the problems. “The problem would not have arisen had Tripathi not sent Antula to jail and had reminded her of her right to file a case against the villagers,” said a top district official, who didn’t want to be identified. Tripathi was not available for comment.
