In an official order, Uttar Pradesh Chief Secretary Deepak Kumar instructed all state departments to ensure that castes are not mentioned in arrest memos, FIRs or any other police documents. The order also instructed that caste-based references displayed on police noticeboards, vehicles and signboards should also be removed.
The order stated that the names of a person's parents can be used for 'identification'. For an effective implementation of this order, the Uttar Pradesh government will also amend the police manuals and standard operating procedures (SOPs).
Exemptions
Though the state government has ordered the removal of caste-based references from police records, it has also given some exemptions. As per the state government, exemptions have been given in those cases that will be filed under the Scheduled Castes (SC) and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.
What was the Allahabad High Court order?
In its September 16 order, the Allahabad High Court directed the Uttar Pradesh government to stop the practice of mentioning a person's caste in police records. The court called the practice "legal fallacy", saying it "undermines constitutional morality" that can pose a "serious challenge to constitutional democracy."
"Recording the caste of the accused as Mali, Pahadi, Rajput, Thakur, Punjabi Parashar and Brahmin in the impugned FIR and seizure memo serves no lawful or legitimate purpose. What is truly unfortunate is that, rather than recommending a departmental inquiry or ensuring the officer undergoes sensitisation on constitutional morality and social concerns, the conduct was defended on vague and unsustainable grounds," the Allahabad High Court said in its order, as reported by news agency PTI.
"Such insensitivity on the part of the state's highest police authority compelled this court to engage in a deeper deliberation on the larger issue of caste based prejudices, leading to the issuance of recommendations (with the hope and expectation that a serious and deliberate consideration by the Union would strengthen the intent of these deliberations to achieve constitutional obligations towards caste-less society) to various departments of the Union Government, as well as specific directions to the State of Uttar Pradesh," it added.
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