Authorities on Wednesday relaxed the curfew in Rajasthan’s Hindaun city for five hours from 1 pm as normalcy returned to Karauli district. It had been imposed on Tuesday after a mob of about 5,000 people set on fire the houses of MLA Rajkumari Jatav and former legislator Bharosilal Jatav, both of whom are Dalits.
“The situation is under control, and no untoward incident has been reported so far,” Karauli District Collector Abhimanyu Kumar told PTI. “Reviewing the law-and-order situation, the curfew has been relaxed for five hours.”
While Rajkumari Jatav is from the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, Bharosilal Jatav was a Congress legislator and a former Union minister. Their houses were set on fire a day after Dalit organisations staged large-scale protests in Rajasthan and several other states against the Supreme Court’s judgement diluting the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. At least nine people were killed in the nationwide demonstrations on Monday.
Among other things, the Supreme Court’s order protects a public servant from being arrested under the law without a preliminary inquiry. After much criticism, the Centre filed a review petition before the bench, but the court on Tuesday refused to stay the order.
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